The Los Angeles Dodgers, a Major League Baseball team based in Los Angeles, CA, are part of the NL West Division. The team was founded in Brooklyn, NY in 1883 and was known as the Brooklyn Dodgers until they moved to Los Angeles before the 1958 season. Brooklyn assisted in making baseball commercial, becoming the setting of the first paid admission games, a series of three all-star contests matching New York and Brooklyn in 1858 and had the first 2 enclosed baseball grounds: the Union Grounds and Capitoline Grounds, which were dedicated ballparks that sped up the advancement from amateurism to professionalism. The team was originally called “the Atlantics,” then, later, “the Grays.”

They got the nickname “Trolley Dodgers”, which was later shortened to Dodgers, while they were playing at Eastern Park in the 1890s because of the difficulty fans and even players had in getting to the ballpark because of all the trolley lines in that area. They also engaged in a series of mergers during this period: in 1888 with the New York Metropolitans, in 1891 with the Brooklyn Wonders and finally in 1900 with the Baltimore Orioles. Then owner Ned Hanlon wanted to buy the team and move them back to Baltimore, but was stopped by Charles Ebbets, a lifelong club employee, who put himself into debt to buy the team and keep it in Brooklyn. He wanted to build a better ballpark than the ones they had. So, after investing heavily again, he financed construction on Ebbets Field, the Dodgers’ home from 1913 until the end of the 1957 season. The Dodgers’ rival team is the San Francisco Giants; the rivalry between the two teams is very heated and more than a century old. It began when both clubs were in New York, with the Dodgers in Brooklyn and the Giants in Manhattan. When both teams moved to California in 1958, the rivalry went with them; the cities of LA and San Francisco have been rivals for a long time in economic, cultural and political arenas throughout the state’s history.

The Los Angeles Dodgers are a Major League Baseball team formed in 1883 in in Brooklyn, New York and moved to Los Angeles, California, before the 1958 season. They are in the Western Division of the National League, their owner is Frank McCourt and menager Joe Torre. The teams logo is cursive "Dodgers" superimposed over a red streaming baseball and their spring training facility is Holman Stadium, Vero Beach, FL, the team is moving to Glendale, AZ in 2009. At the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, the Los Angeles Dodgers played their first game in LA on April 18, 1958, defeating the former New York and now new San Francisco Giants, with 6-5, before 78,672 fans. The Dodgers won the 1965 World Series and the World Series MVP Award and later in both 1966 and 1974 won pennants. After winning 7 pennants and 4 World Series titles over his career, in 1954 the manager Walter Alston cleared the way for an entirely different personality to take his place. In 1983 and 1985 the Dodgers won NL West titles, but lost in the NLCS. The Dodgers had a record of 54-41 in 2007, after sending three players to the all-star game. That was then the best record in the National League. On November 1, 2007, the Dodgers hired the former New York Yankees skipper Joe Torre to be their manager.