It was a fun weekend at Chavez Ravine with the Los Angeles Dodgers celebrating the Los Angeles Lakers in a variety of ways.
On Saturday night, the Dodgers gave out a Showtime Lakers T-shirt to the first 40,000 fans in attendance. Former Lakers like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Byron Scott, Michael Cooper, Mychal Thompson, Kurt Rambis, A.C. Green and James Worthy were all in attendance to throw out the ceremonial first pitch.
That created a special moment for some older fans that root for both the Dodgers and Lakers, and included in that is Dave Roberts.
The Dodgers manager grew up in San Diego and attended UCLA, giving him plenty of opportunities to watch the Showtime Lakers when they were racking up championships in the 1980s.
It was easy to see on Roberts’ face how cool it was for him to meet some of the members of the Showtime squad, and he spoke on what that meant to him, as seen on SportsNet LA:
“It was great seeing the Showtime Lakers. It took me back to being a kid with my dad, listening to Chick Hearn and watching the Lakers play. Watching Magic (Johnson) and all those guys run the floor, I was a huge fan of all those guys. So to see them right there was a moment for me. I didn’t hide it very well. And to see Vanessa here and the babies, it was really good. Kobe loved baseball. So for the relationship with the city, the Lakers and Dodgers, to keep that flame burning is great. The family being here was awesome. Seeing all those 8 and 24 jerseys was fun.”
Los Angeles was lucky to have Chick Hearn calling Lakers games and Vin Scully calling Dodgers games for so many decades. Both are arguably the best ever when it comes to broadcasting their respective sports, but Roberts was not willing to pick one over the other:
“Oh, stop. Not going there. I like L.A., man.”
That was a smart decision by Roberts, who clearly has a lot of respect for the great that came before him whether that be in the baseball diamond, hardwood or broadcast booth.
Dodgers donate to Lakers’ Kobe Bryant’s foundation
The Lakers festivities continued at Dodger Stadium on Sunday when they gave out Kobe Bryant jerseys. His family was in attendance with Kobe’s daughter Bianka throwing out the first pitch to Mookie Betts.
The Dodgers then announced that they would be donating $100,000 to Bryant’s Mamba & Mambacita Sports Foundation, which does outstanding work in the community.
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