It’s a new season but the Los Angeles Dodgers are still celebrating their 2024 World Series championship.
Rapper Ice Cube rolled up to their dugout in a vintage blue convertible with the Commissioner’s Trophy in the front passenger seat. Magic Johnson carried the prize to home plate as fans roared Thursday before the Dodgers’ home opener against the Detroit Tigers.
Players and staff will receive their World Series rings prior to Friday’s game.
Los Angeles began the season in Tokyo earlier this month with a pair of wins over the Chicago Cubs.
Thursday was all about honoring the Dodgers’ victory over the New York Yankees for the eighth World Series championship in franchise history and second since the pandemic-delayed 2020 season.
Kirk Gibson came out to throw the first pitch to World Series MVP Freddie Freeman. A hobbled Gibson belted a pinch-hit, walk-off homer in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series against Oakland to earn a place in Dodgers lore.
Freeman’s walk-off grand slam in Game 1 against the Yankees echoed Gibson’s heroics. Freeman came on the field with his wife, three sons, father and stepmother as fans chanted “Freddie! Freddie!”
“Gibby meet Freddie,” Dodgers broadcaster Joe Davis said in a reversal of his Game 1 call last year when he said, “Freddie meet Gibby” after Freeman’s drive.
Earlier, Mark Walter, Billie Jean King, Ilana Kloss, Todd Boehly and Johnson represented Dodgers ownership in hoisting a blue-and-white World Series flag in center field.
In right field, a baseball with 2024 in blue lettering was unveiled by captains from the Los Angeles and Pasadena fire departments, joining the other seven marking the franchise’s World Series titles.
The newest champions wore jerseys with Dodgers in gold script on the front and their names and numbers in gold on the back.
Led by Shohei Ohtani, players in the starting lineup jogged down a blue carpet from center field to the infield with blue smoke and white fireworks going off.
The Tigers sat in their dugout watching while Detroit starter Tarik Skubal warmed up in right field near the blue carpet. Ohtani briefly acknowledged him as the Japanese superstar jogged by.
Two F-15C aircraft from Fresno, California, and two F-35A Lightning II fighter jets from Arizona roared overhead after Josh Groban sang the national anthem.
A video of last season’s triumph played after a video of the World Series trophy visiting NFL and NBA games in Los Angeles and its trip to Tokyo.
Dodgers utilityman Kike Hernandez missed the game because of illness.
Reporting by The Associated Press.
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