July 20, 2025 • 9 mins
Tim Belcher talks about the '88 World Series, his perspective on the iconic finish to Game 1, and his friendship with Fernando Valenzuela.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
And now an exclusive interview with David Bassey for Dodger Talker. Well,
I'm joined right now. I'm going full fanboy because everybody
that listens to the show knows how much the nineteen
eighty eight Dodgers meant to me, meant to the city
of Los Angeles.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
It was the most.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Magical championship team the Dodgers have ever had in their
franchise's history. The Mets may talk about the sixty nine Mets,
but the eighty eight Dodgers were something on another level.
And we're joined right now by one of the starting
staff members of those eighty eight miracle Dodgers. That's the
one and only Tim Belcher, who started Game One of
(00:39):
the World Series for the Dodgers against the A's.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Tim.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Great to have you back at Dodgers Stadium, and it
looks like you could pitch at least five innings these days.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Uh no, look for deceiv And yeah, I did pitch
Game one. I tell people today still today. That was
the worst game I ever pitched on the biggest, grandest
stage the World Series, but the best game I was
ever a part of.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Thanks to Gibby, you know, set up Gibby.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, well, yeah, I think, I think. I
think the bullpen. When I got knocked out in the
second inning, Tim Leary and three or four other guys
pieced it together and held held the ship, kept us
from sinking any further, and then made made Gibbey's home
run possible.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Tim.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
I've never heard you talk about this, but you being
the starting pitcher out of the game, where were you
when Kirk Gibson hit that home run.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
I was in the clubhouse, drowning in my sorrow of
how poorly I pitched.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
But it was it was so exciting. I mean, you know,
watching it.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
I was in the video room just above the tunnel
as you entered the old clubhouse, and the roar, because
you know, when you're underneath the stadium in the clubhouse
at that time, but still today, I'm sure you can
when something big happens, you can hear everybody standing up,
and hear all the seats lifting up and clacking together,
and people stomping and clapping. I thought the building was
(01:59):
gonna come down right on my head, and at that
point I really didn't care. I was so happy for
our team and happy that I got to spit the
hook for for a game one loss in the World Series.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
What was it like when Gibby came back into the
clubhouse and you guys gathered as you did after every
game for the fruits of victory.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Yeah, it was awesome. It was awesome.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
He was so beat up, you know, and you know
you know this, I know, and most most people that
are true Dodger fans know this. It was the only
a bat that he had in the entire World Series
because he had a knee, he had a hamstring, had
a shoulder issue. He was all beat up, so he
wasn't quite as boisterous and and letting us jump on
him because he was hurting. Yeah, but yeah he still
(02:38):
did to What a team, no doubt about it, And
him and him and Tommy used to sing that out
after every game.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
It was awesome.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
What a special team, no doubt about it. Tim Belcher
a big part of it. What was it about that team?
I asked you earlier, when did you know? When did
you know you guys had something special?
Speaker 2 (02:54):
You know? I don't know. Probably during the Mets series
was for me.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
I mean, you know, well, I think we only won
like ninety two or ninety three regular season games to
win the division, and it wasn't easy.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
I mean, we won it. I don't know a handful
of games.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
We clinched it like a week before the end of
the year, but the division wasn't that strong at that point,
and our team really on paper when you looked at it,
I mean, I'm sure there are a lot of other
Dodger champions. I'm sure the eighty one team looks at
our roster compared to those and they're like, how in.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
The hell they do that? You know, But it was
it was a true team.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
I mean it was. It was a mixture of guys
at a point in their career that it just it
just all meshed, it all worked, you know, guys like
Franklin Stubbs and Mickey Hatcher and Rick Dempsey, you know,
the stuntmen we called them, and Dave Anderson. They were
so integral in what we did throughout that year.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And then into the end of the postseason.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
I mean, Micky Hatcher had an incredible postseason. So yeah,
it was it was I forget they're just your initial question.
I kind of got off on a tangent there.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
It was awesome. It was great.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
I don't think any of us really thought that we
were going to be a World Series champion until it
actually got close, you know, until we beat the Mets,
because I think the Mets were every bit as good
as the A's and that was a hard fought seven
game series. So I think then we knew, hey, we
can we can handle them in seven games. You know,
we got a chance against this Oakland club club. I
(04:21):
don't care about the Bash brothers. You know, we got
good pitching and we can we can do this, and uh,
you know, five games later we did.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
That's a good way to know that you got something
special when you beat the team that beat you ten
out of eleven times in the regular season.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Yeah, they handled us.
Speaker 3 (04:38):
I mean we didn't have a prayer against them during
the regular year, and you know they were they were
coming off of a championship in what eighty six, and
they still had the nucleus of that team.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
I mean, they had a great roster, they really did.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
But you know, there was just something about the magic
of our of our roster and the makeup of our
our guys that you know, you know, when you got
a guy late in his career like a Rick Dempsey
that played such an integral role and catching it, actually
caught the lost last out, the last pitch.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
From Oral in Game five.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
And then somebody like Mickey Hatcher at the stage of
his career doing what he did in the postseason.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
I mean, after a while, guys just rally around.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
That and just kind of, you know, kind of raised
raised us all up to do better things.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
That's the voice of Tim Belcher, part of the great
magical season of nineteen eighty eight for the Dodgers. How
about Mike sosis home run in Game four and the NLCS.
That has got to be one of the top home
runs more improbable home runs. I mean that must have
signaled something special.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Improbable, a little bit improbable because of the stage, you know,
twelfth inning of a of a playoff game and so forth,
away from home.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
We were in Chase Stadium.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
But and off of Doc Gooden. Doc Gooden was an
incredible pitcher. But those of us play, those of us
have played with Mike new He hit Doc Gooden pretty good.
Soosha could really hit guys that through unbelievable fastballs.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
You know.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
He did pretty well against Nolan Ryan as well, So
that part of it wasn't that big a surprise. But
you know, without that home run, we may not win
that series. We don't win that series. The Gibson home
run never happens.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
You know.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
The whole magic of what transpired after that never happens.
And I think about that, I kind of get chills
when I think about every time I think about the
eighty eight team, I get I literally get goosebumps on
my arms to this day when I think about it,
because it was so magical to be a part of.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
But moments like that, you.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Know, I don't know, two or three times during the year,
Gibson scored from second base on a wild pitch in
Dodger Stadium, which if you could run a little bit,
wasn't all that hard to do because it was so
far back then. But the fearlessness and the guts that
it took to do that like he did, and things
that he did just you know, like I said, it
(06:58):
just perme our locker room and made us all better.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
Tim Belcher's Dodger career didn't end at the end of
nineteen eighty eight. You were part of the team following
those seasons, being teammates with Fernando Valenzuela, who's being honored,
got the pen on your caller, What did Fernando mean
to you as a teammate?
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Friend first and foremost, great teammate, good friend. We had
some good times together. We were kind of running mates
on the road. You know, we go out and it's
trying not to get too much mischief. But with Fernando
that wasn't always easy. That wasn't always easy to avoid.
Speaker 2 (07:31):
Great friend.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
I still some of my greatest memories of him is
not so much you know, when he threw the no hitter,
which was tremendous.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
My greatest memories of him is just his friendship and
the funny things that he would do.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
You know. He would sit in his locker in the
clubhouse during the afternoon after batting practice, and the media
members would be walking through, you know, the beat writers
and stuff, getting interviews before it's time for them to
leave the locker room, and he'd sit there with a
rope a lasso and he could lasso Guys would walk by,
Gernick or somebody for instance, to walk by.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
And in stride.
Speaker 3 (08:03):
He could lasso as as he was striding, as his
foot was up off the ground and yank his leg back.
He did that all the time. Stuff like that. I
mean just you know, when I think of Fernando, I'm
missing him so much. Just a great guy, great friend,
great teammate, and.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Just so funny. I mean just comedic, funny, really funny guy.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
If you're great friends of Fernando, that meant you spend
a lot of time with him on the golf course.
I heard he used to tip the scales his way.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Oh yeah, yeah, he could do that, he you know,
and he wasn't He wasn't what you would call your
classic pure golfer.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
He was. He was a hack.
Speaker 3 (08:39):
I mean, he would hit what I would call a
banana ball, but he knew, he knew he was gonna slice,
so he'd play for it. You know, he'd a'm he'd
aim all the way right and it sliced back into
the fairway down the middle. You know.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Uh. But he was fun on the golf course too.
Speaker 3 (08:53):
There's no no better time than in Vero Beach that
I remember this. You know, after a after a workout
and you know, pictures would typically be done early, and
you know, get out there on the golf course by
two or three o'clock in the afternoon with Fernando and
have a couple of beers.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
Or whatever, and he just great, great fun.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Tim, This has been really special. If you would have
told twelve year old David Bass saying nineteen eighty eight
I'd have a chance to interview Tim Belcher, I would
have tipped over in my chair back then on the
reserve level at Dodgers Stadium. You guys in nineteen eighty
eight were just larger than life, and certainly everybody loved
you guys.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
Yeah, well thanks, thanks for saying that, and you having
grown up with this team and being being so impressionable
at such an impressionable age when we had that magical season.
It's great for me to see you doing what you're
doing now. I'm sure it's a great thrill for you.
So thank you very much.
And now an exclusive interview with David Bassey for Dodger Talker. Well,
I'm joined right now. I'm going full fanboy because everybody
that listens to the show knows how much the nineteen
eighty eight Dodgers meant to me, meant to the city
of Los Angeles.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
It was the most.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Magical championship team the Dodgers have ever had in their
franchise's history. The Mets may talk about the sixty nine Mets,
but the eighty eight Dodgers were something on another level.
And we're joined right now by one of the starting
staff members of those eighty eight miracle Dodgers. That's the
one and only Tim Belcher, who started Game One of
(00:39):
the World Series for the Dodgers against the A's.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Tim.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Great to have you back at Dodgers Stadium, and it
looks like you could pitch at least five innings these days.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Uh no, look for deceiv And yeah, I did pitch
Game one. I tell people today still today. That was
the worst game I ever pitched on the biggest, grandest
stage the World Series, but the best game I was
ever a part of.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Thanks to Gibby, you know, set up Gibby.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, well, yeah, I think, I think. I
think the bullpen. When I got knocked out in the
second inning, Tim Leary and three or four other guys
pieced it together and held held the ship, kept us
from sinking any further, and then made made Gibbey's home
run possible.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Tim.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
I've never heard you talk about this, but you being
the starting pitcher out of the game, where were you
when Kirk Gibson hit that home run.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
I was in the clubhouse, drowning in my sorrow of
how poorly I pitched.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
But it was it was so exciting. I mean, you know,
watching it.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
I was in the video room just above the tunnel
as you entered the old clubhouse, and the roar, because
you know, when you're underneath the stadium in the clubhouse
at that time, but still today, I'm sure you can
when something big happens, you can hear everybody standing up,
and hear all the seats lifting up and clacking together,
and people stomping and clapping. I thought the building was
(01:59):
gonna come down right on my head, and at that
point I really didn't care. I was so happy for
our team and happy that I got to spit the
hook for for a game one loss in the World Series.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
What was it like when Gibby came back into the
clubhouse and you guys gathered as you did after every
game for the fruits of victory.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Yeah, it was awesome. It was awesome.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
He was so beat up, you know, and you know
you know this, I know, and most most people that
are true Dodger fans know this. It was the only
a bat that he had in the entire World Series
because he had a knee, he had a hamstring, had
a shoulder issue. He was all beat up, so he
wasn't quite as boisterous and and letting us jump on
him because he was hurting. Yeah, but yeah he still
(02:38):
did to What a team, no doubt about it, And
him and him and Tommy used to sing that out
after every game.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
It was awesome.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
What a special team, no doubt about it. Tim Belcher
a big part of it. What was it about that team?
I asked you earlier, when did you know? When did
you know you guys had something special?
Speaker 2 (02:54):
You know? I don't know. Probably during the Mets series
was for me.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
I mean, you know, well, I think we only won
like ninety two or ninety three regular season games to
win the division, and it wasn't easy.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
I mean, we won it. I don't know a handful
of games.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
We clinched it like a week before the end of
the year, but the division wasn't that strong at that point,
and our team really on paper when you looked at it,
I mean, I'm sure there are a lot of other
Dodger champions. I'm sure the eighty one team looks at
our roster compared to those and they're like, how in.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
The hell they do that? You know, But it was
it was a true team.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
I mean it was. It was a mixture of guys
at a point in their career that it just it
just all meshed, it all worked, you know, guys like
Franklin Stubbs and Mickey Hatcher and Rick Dempsey, you know,
the stuntmen we called them, and Dave Anderson. They were
so integral in what we did throughout that year.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And then into the end of the postseason.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
I mean, Micky Hatcher had an incredible postseason. So yeah,
it was it was I forget they're just your initial question.
I kind of got off on a tangent there.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
It was awesome. It was great.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
I don't think any of us really thought that we
were going to be a World Series champion until it
actually got close, you know, until we beat the Mets,
because I think the Mets were every bit as good
as the A's and that was a hard fought seven
game series. So I think then we knew, hey, we
can we can handle them in seven games. You know,
we got a chance against this Oakland club club. I
(04:21):
don't care about the Bash brothers. You know, we got
good pitching and we can we can do this, and uh,
you know, five games later we did.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
That's a good way to know that you got something
special when you beat the team that beat you ten
out of eleven times in the regular season.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Yeah, they handled us.
Speaker 3 (04:38):
I mean we didn't have a prayer against them during
the regular year, and you know they were they were
coming off of a championship in what eighty six, and
they still had the nucleus of that team.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
I mean, they had a great roster, they really did.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
But you know, there was just something about the magic
of our of our roster and the makeup of our
our guys that you know, you know, when you got
a guy late in his career like a Rick Dempsey
that played such an integral role and catching it, actually
caught the lost last out, the last pitch.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
From Oral in Game five.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
And then somebody like Mickey Hatcher at the stage of
his career doing what he did in the postseason.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
I mean, after a while, guys just rally around.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
That and just kind of, you know, kind of raised
raised us all up to do better things.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
That's the voice of Tim Belcher, part of the great
magical season of nineteen eighty eight for the Dodgers. How
about Mike sosis home run in Game four and the NLCS.
That has got to be one of the top home
runs more improbable home runs. I mean that must have
signaled something special.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Improbable, a little bit improbable because of the stage, you know,
twelfth inning of a of a playoff game and so forth,
away from home.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
We were in Chase Stadium.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
But and off of Doc Gooden. Doc Gooden was an
incredible pitcher. But those of us play, those of us
have played with Mike new He hit Doc Gooden pretty good.
Soosha could really hit guys that through unbelievable fastballs.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
You know.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
He did pretty well against Nolan Ryan as well, So
that part of it wasn't that big a surprise. But
you know, without that home run, we may not win
that series. We don't win that series. The Gibson home
run never happens.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
You know.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
The whole magic of what transpired after that never happens.
And I think about that, I kind of get chills
when I think about every time I think about the
eighty eight team, I get I literally get goosebumps on
my arms to this day when I think about it,
because it was so magical to be a part of.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
But moments like that, you.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Know, I don't know, two or three times during the year,
Gibson scored from second base on a wild pitch in
Dodger Stadium, which if you could run a little bit,
wasn't all that hard to do because it was so
far back then. But the fearlessness and the guts that
it took to do that like he did, and things
that he did just you know, like I said, it
(06:58):
just perme our locker room and made us all better.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
Tim Belcher's Dodger career didn't end at the end of
nineteen eighty eight. You were part of the team following
those seasons, being teammates with Fernando Valenzuela, who's being honored,
got the pen on your caller, What did Fernando mean
to you as a teammate?
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Friend first and foremost, great teammate, good friend. We had
some good times together. We were kind of running mates
on the road. You know, we go out and it's
trying not to get too much mischief. But with Fernando
that wasn't always easy. That wasn't always easy to avoid.
Speaker 2 (07:31):
Great friend.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
I still some of my greatest memories of him is
not so much you know, when he threw the no hitter,
which was tremendous.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
My greatest memories of him is just his friendship and
the funny things that he would do.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
You know. He would sit in his locker in the
clubhouse during the afternoon after batting practice, and the media
members would be walking through, you know, the beat writers
and stuff, getting interviews before it's time for them to
leave the locker room, and he'd sit there with a
rope a lasso and he could lasso Guys would walk by,
Gernick or somebody for instance, to walk by.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
And in stride.
Speaker 3 (08:03):
He could lasso as as he was striding, as his
foot was up off the ground and yank his leg back.
He did that all the time. Stuff like that. I
mean just you know, when I think of Fernando, I'm
missing him so much. Just a great guy, great friend,
great teammate, and.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Just so funny. I mean just comedic, funny, really funny guy.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
If you're great friends of Fernando, that meant you spend
a lot of time with him on the golf course.
I heard he used to tip the scales his way.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Oh yeah, yeah, he could do that, he you know,
and he wasn't He wasn't what you would call your
classic pure golfer.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
He was. He was a hack.
Speaker 3 (08:39):
I mean, he would hit what I would call a
banana ball, but he knew, he knew he was gonna slice,
so he'd play for it. You know, he'd a'm he'd
aim all the way right and it sliced back into
the fairway down the middle. You know.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Uh. But he was fun on the golf course too.
Speaker 3 (08:53):
There's no no better time than in Vero Beach that
I remember this. You know, after a after a workout
and you know, pictures would typically be done early, and
you know, get out there on the golf course by
two or three o'clock in the afternoon with Fernando and
have a couple of beers.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
Or whatever, and he just great, great fun.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Tim, This has been really special. If you would have
told twelve year old David Bass saying nineteen eighty eight
I'd have a chance to interview Tim Belcher, I would
have tipped over in my chair back then on the
reserve level at Dodgers Stadium. You guys in nineteen eighty
eight were just larger than life, and certainly everybody loved
you guys.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
Yeah, well thanks, thanks for saying that, and you having
grown up with this team and being being so impressionable
at such an impressionable age when we had that magical season.
It's great for me to see you doing what you're
doing now. I'm sure it's a great thrill for you.
So thank you very much.
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