Before They Wore Dodger Blue: Tommy Lasorda and the Greatest Draft Class in Baseball History

Before They Wore Dodger Blue: Tommy Lasorda and the Greatest Draft Class in Baseball HistoryThe Brooklyn Los Angeles Dodgers were always groundbreakers on the player development front, and when MLB instituted a amateur player draft in 1965, the Dodgers were ready: by 1968, the disciplined front office and scouting department put together what is still considered today as the greatest draft class in pro baseball history. That year, the Dodgers drafted six future All StarsDoyle Alexander, Bill Buckner, Ron Cey, Steve Garvey, Davey Lopes, and

The Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers were always groundbreakers on the player-development front, and when MLB instituted a amateur player draft in 1965, the Dodgers were ready: by 1968, the disciplined front office and scouting department put together what is still considered today as the greatest draft class in pro baseball history.

That year, the Dodgers drafted six future All-Stars—Doyle Alexander, Bill Buckner, Ron Cey, Steve Garvey, Davey Lopes, and Tom Paciorek, who would be selected for a combined 23 All-Star games—plus Joe Ferguson, Bobby Valentine, and Geoff Zahn. Most of these draftees—joined at various stops by Tommy Hutton, Charlie Hough, and Bill Russell—would form the core of outstanding minor league teams as well as Dodgers teams featuring a remarkably stable infield that would play together for eight years, highlighted by a 1981 World Series win. It's widely regarded as the best draft class ever, and the 1970 Spokane Indians—featuring most of that draft class, led by Tommy Lasorda—one of the greatest minor-league clubs ever.

How the Dodgers put together that legendary draft class and how they were developed by Lasorda is told in Before They Wore Dodger Blue: Tommy Lasorda and the Greatest Draft Class in Baseball History, Eric Vickrey's exhaustively researched history of the development of the 1968 Los Angeles Dodgers draft class. Key to the development of this draft class: Lasorda, who worked his way through the minors as the manager of virtually all these draftees at stops in Pocatello, Ogden, and Spokane, culminating in his appointment as Walt Alston's replacement as Dodger manager near the end of the 1976 season.

Cey, Russell, Lopes, and Garvey proceeded to form an All-Star infield that would play together for an unprecedented eight and a half consecutive seasons. That foursome, along with other homegrown stars and pieces acquired through trades involving the ’68 draft class, carried the Dodgers to three National League pennants in the 1970s and a World Series title in 1981 under Lasorda.

“[Tommy] Lasorda developed into a master,” said Bobby Valentine, the leading light in the draft class before injuries cut his career short, in an interview with the author. “His baseball acumen, his ability to manage a game is always overshadowed by his persona. He was a spectacular in-game manager. He knew when to put on a hit-and-run. When a guy was in a slump, he’d give him a high-five when he came into the dugout. That would boost the guy’s confidence for the next at-bat. He knew when to take a pitcher out, when to leave him in, when to challenge him, when to take a kid out for a private dinner, and when to scold a kid in front of the entire team.”

Early Praise for Before They Wore Dodger Blue
“In the early days of the MLB draft, and before the advent of free agency, the core of four pennant-winning teams came up together, along with their manager, through the Dodger farm system. The last chapter before big-league glory played out in Spokane, where Tommy Lasorda’s squad of future Dodger stars won the Pacific Coast League championship. This is a significant piece of baseball history, and a story brimming with figures soon to become boldface names.”—Bob Costas, 2018 Ford C. Frick Award winner and longtime MLB broadcaster

“Like many fans, I enjoy baseball books that examine a nexus point in the history of the sport. Think of Jim Bouton’s Ball Four here, or Roger Kahn’s The Boys of Summer, or Dan Epstein’s Big Hair and Plastic Grass. Eric Vickrey’s Before They Wore Dodger Blue opens with the well-covered heyday of the early 1960s Los Angeles Dodgers but then breaks new ground by examining how the first major-league amateur draft, instituted in 1965, completely upended the Dodgers and changed the culture of the major leagues. Whereas an ecosystem of cigar-chomping regional scouts, bushwhacking birddogs, militaristic coaches, and tightly prescriptive training philosophies had ruled before the draft, the aftermath not only knocked the über-traditional boys in blue from its perennial pennant pedestal, but pushed the sport toward sharper analytics, new-style player-friendly managers, a restive players union, the first-ever collective players strike, the overthrow of the reserve clause, and the emergence of free agency. Vickrey deftly paints a portrait of these changing times, reaching a climax with the 1981 World Series, when the rebuilt Dodgers and their core draftee class of 1968 come back to defeat the juggernaut New York Yankees and their team of superstar free agents. Before They Wore Dodger Blue is an exciting and essential look at how a brave new world emerged out of the primordial, old school baseball soup of the 1960s.”—Michael Fallon, author of Dodgerland: Decadent Los Angeles and the 1977–78 Dodgers

“The amateur draft was supposed to let poorer clubs compete with the big-money franchises, such as the Dodgers. But picking winners was about more than money and the 1968 draft proved it. There was the scouting that recognized Steve Garvey, Davey Lopes, Ron Cey, Bobby Valentine, Bill Buckner, Tom Paciorek, Joe Ferguson, Doyle Alexander, Sandy Vance and Geoff Zahn that spring. And there was the player development system, epitomized by Tommy Lasorda, that transformed the talent into major league stars. Vickrey profiles them all, delving into their backgrounds and careers in a crisp presentation that makes the story sparkle.”—Andy McCue, author of Seymour Medal-winning Mover and Shaker: Walter O’Malley, the Dodgers, and Baseball’s Westward Expansion

“An amazing literary journey through a baseball time capsule thanks to Eric Vickrey’s exhaustive research and master storytelling. Relive the behind-the-scenes drama and thrills when an ambitious minor-league manager with a larger-than-life personality and a bumper crop of top prospects eventually became Southern California’s beloved Big Blue Wrecking Crew.”—Mark Langill, Team Historian, Los Angeles Dodgers

“In Before They Wore Dodger Blue, Eric Vickrey does a masterful job of taking the reader behind the scenes of the Los Angeles Dodgers’ famed Amateur Draft of 1968 and how this group of players came together with the Spokane Indians of 1970 and launched highly acclaimed major-league careers. Eric’s dedicated work provides insights into an organization known for its scouting and player development departments while providing a look at the talent and personalities of players who reached stardom. All of this while a little-known minor-league manager named Tommy Lasorda made his way from Spokane to the Hall of Fame and remained an influence on the lives of young men who had their baseball dreams come true.”—Fred Claire, Los Angeles Dodgers GM and Executive VP, 1969-1998 and author of My 30 Years in Dodger Blue and EXTRA INNINGS: Fred Claire's Journey to City of Hope

About the Author
Eric Vickrey is a baseball historian and author of two books, Runnin’ Redbirds: The World Champion 1982 St. Louis Cardinals and Season of Shattered Dreams: Postwar Baseball, the Spokane Indians, and a Tragic Bus Crash That Changed Everything. The latter was a finalist for the 2024 CASEY Award for Best Baseball Book of the Year. He has also contributed to several books and written dozens of online articles as a member of the Society for American Baseball Research and is co-editing a forthcoming book on the 2001 Seattle Mariners. Originally from Illinois, he now lives in Washington state with his wife, Gina, and their two cats, Edgar and Ralphie. 

Fast Facts
Price: $24.95.
Print ISBN: 978-1-938532-94-8.
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-938532-95-5.
Format: 6x9, 348 pages

Paperback resellers:
Amazon | Ingram | Barnes & Noble | bookstore.org | Powell's | Books-A-Million | Hudson Booksellers | Waterstones | Blackwell's | Foyle's

ebook resellers:
Amazon | Ingram | Barnes & Noble Nook | Apple Books | bookstore.org | Kobo | Indigo/Chapters |

Bookstores/libraries:
Ingram