My Love Letter to The Dodgers
Dear Dodgers,
I grew up watching your team play baseball on tv with my Dad. I always tell people that I inherited my fandom from him. It’s a family affair, and I was born into it.
But I never actually attended a game until I was 22. As it turns out, this was the most perfect time in my life for this to happen.
This time last year, college soccer had just ended for me, and I had a giant cavity in my soul because of it. I had spent the first four months of 2017 trying to find something that would excite and impassion me the same way soccer had for the past 18 years. Somehow, at the conclusion of my collegiate career, that feeling had vanished into thin air.
Then I walked into Dodger Stadium.
I still remember the day–April 5th, 2017–you were playing the Padres. The weather was warm, but the air was just slightly chilled with the springtime temperatures. We sat in left field, Dodger Dogs in hand, hand over heart as the National Anthem played, daytime turned to dusk, the lights flipped on and the iconic catch phrase “IT’S TIME FOR DODGER BASEBALL!” echoed through the ravine.
That was when I knew I was falling in love.
Some people are going to roll their eyes at me.
How can you be romantic about baseball?
After April 5th, I watched every game I could that was available on our cable channels, and the one’s I couldn’t watch, I followed the play by play updates through the MLB app. Yes. There were many Saturday nights I sat in movie theaters and on dates sneaking glances at my phone as the pitches came in on the digital batters box.
I wish I could explain it. But that gaping hole in my heart, that absence of passion for something in my life, was filled by Dodger baseball. It was filled by the scrappiness of the players and the season. All the 9th inning walk-offs to come back from a 5-run deficit, all the Puig theatrics, all the Bellinger-bombs. I was in love with the game, with the team, and with the franchise.
I returned to LA in August for a game and vacation. Ironically, you were playing the Padres again. You lost. This was the beginning of an entire month of losing — right before the world series. This was when I learned what it meant to be a resilient fan. This was when I remembered that relationships have rough patches, and that like relationships, they are worth seeing through.
And then came the World Series.
As a sports purist, I couldn’t have asked for a better performance of skill, ability, and passion.
As a Dodger’s fan, my heart was broken.
(And my dog, my four-legged best friend of 11 years, died the next day, so November 2nd was really a dark and depressing day for me overall)
But here we are in February, and today is the first day of spring season, and I feel just as excited and in love as I did last April.
I’m ready for another thrilling season, and a few more Dodger Dogs to come.
I can’t wait to get back into left field and be surrounded by the electric fandom of the native LA season ticket holders.
I am unapologetically, unconditionally, and uncontrollably in love with Dodger baseball. It filled my empty heart, took me on a rollercoaster of excitement, disappointment, heartbreak, and hope.
Cheers to what I’m sure will be one of the most fulfilling long-term relationships of my life.
It’s time for the Boys in Blue to rally, and I’m here for it.
Thank you for everything, Dodgers. Good luck today. I’ll be watching.
Love,
Madisyn
