He’s coming home, to a place he never should have left.
He is an ex Cheater who should have been a Dodger forever.
Now, finally, he will be.
Dusty Baker will finally be properly and uniquely honored at Dodger Stadium on Friday night, 41 years after he was unceremoniously expelled from the organization amid a dark cloud of baseless drug rumors.
He loved the Dodgers very much. The Dodgers hurt him deeply. The ties were broken. Distance was created. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right. It needed to be fixed.
Read more: Stars still have their enemies, but Dusty Baker somehow finds love
And so it has been, Baker returning to become the eighth member of the “Legends of Dodger Baseball,” the club’s unofficial Hall of Fame for those not inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.
The ceremony will be full of relief and respect, as even the mere title of honor fits perfectly.
Dusty Baker is a legend. And Dusty Baker is Dodgers baseball.
“I loved the Dodgers, I loved the fans, I was home,” the Riverside native said this week in a phone interview from his home in Sacramento. “I never wanted to leave.”
His premature departure from Chavez Ravine after the 1983 season was a blessing in disguise, eventually leading the outfielder to a future Hall of Fame coaching career that spanned five teams, 2,183 wins and a World Series Championship with the Houston Astros in 2022.
Over a 26-year period, he became known to the rest of the baseball world as an eccentric presence in a dugout with a stick dangling from his lips, heavy bracelets adorning his arms and a peculiar use of the bullpen.
But to Dodger fans, he was always just Dusty.
“Dusty was the perfect fuel for the beginning of the Tom Lasorda era,” he said. Mark LangillDodgers historian. “He was the kind of energetic veteran that a rookie coach really needed. He became the club’s leader as the Dodgers overcame the Big Red Machine and restored their place atop the National League West.
The charismatic outfielder was traded here in a blockbuster deal with the Atlanta Braves after the 1975 season. He was the last of the four Dodgers to hit 30 home runs in 1977, completing the historic feat in his final at-bat of the season.
He was the co-inventor of the high-five after slapping a teammate’s hand Glenn Burke after that historic home run. He was the first MVP of the National League Championship Series later that fall, when he had two home runs and eight RBIs against the Philadelphia Phillies.
He was the heart of 1981 World Series Champion Team. The following season, he hit .300 with 23 home runs and 88 RBIs.
He was a local favorite with his incredible athleticism and easy smile. People sat in the left pavilion just to be close to him. He was part arrogance, part sweetness, all grace.
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“He was the right player at the right time, a truly beloved Dodger,” Langill said.
Then, in the winter of 1983, after eight memorable summers, he was gone, sent away by a franchise that thought he was involved in drugs.
There was no evidence. Baker was never formally charged. Although his name was later mentioned by a buffet dealer in the infamous Pittsburgh drug trials of 1985, he was never part of that scandal, or any scandal.
He was shunned in silence. Nobody said anything. The Dodgers never admitted anything. It was all a whisper. But the reality was deafening.
The Dodgers were tired of dealing with Steve Howe‘s drug problems and believed Baker was somehow involved with Howe, so they threw him under the bus.
They initially tried to trade it. But his contract contained a no-trade clause. So they just cut it off. It was weird, it was a mess, and Baker was devastated.
He played just three more major league seasons before retiring a deeply wounded hero.
“I didn’t leave under really pleasant circumstances,” said Baker, 75. “The rumors were very hurtful, they hurt a lot, rumors always hurt, I’ll tell the story one day, I’m not ready to open that wound yet.
At the time, the hole created by Baker’s surprise departure was wide open, his reputation endorsed by a former teammate who had left the team a year earlier.
“Transitions are always difficult, but what happened to Dusty was a complete injustice,” former Dodger Steve Garvey once told Ross Newhan of The Times.
But Baker resisted, pushing forward inspired by life’s basic lessons.
“At some point, you have to forgive and move on with your life,” Baker said. “I’ve always believed that you have to take the negative and turn it into a positive, and that’s what I tried to do.”
That’s exactly what he did, accepting a coaching job with the San Francisco Giants in 1988 before becoming their manager in 1993 and beginning an unusual odyssey for a former Dodgers star.
He managed teams that Dodgers fans hated — most notably the Giants and Houston Astros — but Dodgers fans rarely booed him in person.
“People always said that no matter what they thought of my team, they were rooting for me and I will never forget that,” he said.
He’ll thank fans on Friday in what should be an emotional return, especially if it includes the best example of Baker’s community connection.
Their names are Charlie, Carlos, Rueben, Ernie and Leslie.
They were once teenagers who cheered for Baker in the pavilion during games and then waited for him in the parking lot. He adopted them as his unofficial fan club, a diverse mix of locals who eventually followed him throughout his career, showing up all over the league to cheer him on.
“There were three or four Mexican guys, some brothers, some white guys, they were all my kids, I gave them tickets and dances and they all grew up and became fathers,” Baker recalled. “It was really cool.”
During the ceremony, Baker will also be able to honor the memory of one of his closest teammates and friends, the late baseball player Burke first openly gay player who credited Baker with offering unconditional support.
It is estimated that on the final day of the 1977 season, the two men combined in what would have been the first display of a joyous celebration that took place across the world.
Yes, they invented the high-five, although Baker refuses to take any credit.
“Glenn Burke did everything, he slapped his hand and I just slapped it back, I didn’t know it was a big deal,” Baker said. “I was happy, Glenn was happy, it was a cool moment.”
Burke was traded to Oakland in 1978, but the two men remained close. In 1994, the Baker’s Giants teamed up with the Until There A Cure Foundation to become the first professional sports team to host an AIDS benefit game. Burke died of AIDS-related causes a year later, while Baker continued to minister to AIDS patients in the Bay Area, bringing meals and comfort.
“I’ve always tried to make a positive impact on people,” Baker said. “It says in the Bible that to be watered you have to water others, and I believe that.”
Read more: Glenn Burke was the ideal Dodger teammate whose sexuality was not an issue
Now that those waters have returned him to the Dodgers, Baker could easily ponder what might have been…
…He finishes his playing career with the Dodgers, joins Lasorda’s staff, replaces Lasorda upon retirement, and is still a Dodger today…
No. Dusty Baker isn’t thinking about any of that. He says he wouldn’t have changed anything. He is happy where he serves as a consultant to the Giants. He’s equally happy to set his other foot in Dodger Stadium.
You’ll eventually have to give him up, Giants, because Dusty is a Dodger.
“My dream was to come here and I’m grateful to be back,” Baker said.
High five for that.
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This story originally appeared on Los Angeles Times.
