When a pitcher purposely throws high and inside, the batter has four choices.He can stare down the pitcher. He can charge the mound. He can get revenge by walloping the next pitch for a hit.Or he can ignore the intimidation tactic and continue as if nothing happened.The last choice is the wimp’s way out, since the batter will lose his teammates’ respect, while opposing pitchers will consider him a pushover and fire more brushback pitches at him.Ever since the Dodgers visited the White House last spring to commemorate their 2024 World Series win, President Trump has launched a barrage of metaphorical fastballs trying to hurt Los Angeles — in the courts, in speeches and on social media, but especially via his deportation deluge that’s starting to simmer again.So how have the Boys in Blue responded in defense of the metropolis they wear on their jerseys and the community that has sustained them for nearly 70 years, making Dem Bums one of the most valuable franchises in baseball?They’re scheduled to visit the White House today so Trump can use them as a photo op and bask in their 2025 championship.That’s like staying in the dugout during a bench-clearing brawl after a pitcher plonks a batter, then offering the offender a handshake the next inning.Winning back-to-back titles and blazing through this season has brought Angelenos much-needed happiness during a terrible stretch for the city — but winning is what the Dodgers are supposed to do. They’re also supposed to do more.This is the team of pioneers like Jackie Robinson and Sandy Koufax, Glenn Burke and Fernando Valenzuela. The squad whose mythology insists it’s a franchise apart from the rest of professional sports because the Dodger Way is kinder, braver and more willing to take moral risks that transcend baseball and make society better. And yet manager Dave Roberts told Times sports columnist Bill Shaikin in February that he would gladly accept another White House invitation “to continue to try to do what tradition says and not try to make political statements, because I am not a politician.”Well, thank God the Dodgers broke baseball’s longstanding tradition of segregation long before Roberts, who is Black and Japanese American, was born! Manager Dave Roberts of the Los Angeles Dodgers looks on from the dugout during a 2025 game against the San Diego Padres at Petco Park in San Diego, California. (Sean M. Haffey/Getty Images) Most of the Blue Crew fans I know — who are mostly Trump haters, by the way — roll their eyes every time a wokoso member of Dodger Nation complains about the team’s White House visits or the failure of players, coaches and executives to speak out more forcefully against Trump’s anti-immigrant campaign. Politics have no place in baseball, my friends and family members will say. But standing up for L.A. by snubbing Trump or calling out his war against us isn’t political at all.Angelenos need a champion on the Dodgers to say what needs to be said: The City of Angels is wonderful, and Trump is wrong to target it. If you can’t stand up for the simple belief that we don’t deserve to be Trump’s personal piñata, then you have no place playing for the Dodgers.Only two players have announced they’re not going to the White House: superstar Mookie Betts and fan favorite Kiké Hernández. The latter, a native of Puerto Rico, endeared himself to the Dodger faithful last year during the height of the immigration raids with an Instagram post that read, “I cannot tolerate watching our community continue to be violated, attacked, abused and separated. ALL people deserve to be treated with respect, dignity and their human rights.”This time around, Hernández told the Times that he’s not going so he can focus on a rehabilitation stint in the minors. When pressed by reporter Maddie Lee, he said, “I’d rather take a day off than do team activities.”Nice way to rhetorically strike out, Kiké.Betts, meanwhile, said he wants to spend time with his newborn child — as legitimate a reason as any. But then he sat down for a short interview with Fox News.“I don’t know why the world sees athletes as political figures or these people that can make change,” Betts said. The future Hall of Famer, who like Roberts owes a lot to Robinson for paving the way for him and other Black players, hemmed and hawed as if he didn’t quite believe what he was saying.Dodgers past and present haven’t been averse to political stands — they just usually happen to be of the conservative variety. After his retirement, Robinson campaigned for Richard Nixon’s unsuccessful 1960 presidential bid but left the GOP eight years later, accusing Nixon of “prostituting himself to the bigots in the South” to win the presidency. Other Dodger legends, from former owner Peter O’Malley to Steve Garvey to Tommy Lasorda, were proud, vocal Republicans as well. Reliever Blake Treinen pitched in a game with “Charlie Kirk” written on his hat after the assassination of the far-right commentator — you know, the guy who lambasted L.A.’s response to Trump’s immigration hammer as “open rebellion to American sovereignty and authority … in a corrupt blue city.” Treinen — who skipped the Dodgers’ 2021 White House visit when Joe Biden occupied the Oval Office — was at it again this year when he and teammate Alex Call declined to wear Pride Night-themed caps, choosing instead to play with the standard-issue one. They followed the example of Dodgers titan Clayton Kershaw, who wore a Pride cap last year but adorned it with a verse from the Book of Genesis commandeered by MAGA Christians to accuse LGBT+ people of appropriating rainbow colors to celebrate their supposedly wicked ways.Dodgers management didn’t browbeat Treinen and Call, and that’s fine — ballplayers should be entitled to share their personal thoughts, however noxious. I even understand why the team might want to ham it up with Trump this week — that’s what multimillionaires seem to want to do these days, after all. Federal agents stage outside Gate E of Dodger Stadium on June 19, 2025. (Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times) What offends me most is that Dodgers owner Mark Walter knows what Trump is doing to L.A. is wrong, even if he’ll never publicly say anything.Last June, the team announced that it had prevented Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents from entering the Dodger Stadium parking lot — the feds denied that this happened. The Dodgers also announced they would donate $1.1 million to nonprofits to assist people affected by the immigration raids — a response to community disgust about video of federal agents in front of a Dodger Stadium gate with people who had been detained at a nearby Home Depot. Soon after, the Dodgers were hit with a federal civil rights complaint, filed by a legal group co-founded by Stephen Miller, accusing them of discrimination because of their diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. This year, Walter’s investment firm rid itself of all shares in GEO Group, which runs immigrant detention centers on behalf of the federal government.Yet now, the Dodgers are going to the White House. Enjoy the trip, fellas. Hey, maybe one of you will shake Trump’s hand and tell him that multicultural, immigrant, Dodgers-blue Los Angeles is all right. Hey, maybe the Angels will win the pennant.
