Dodgers Diaries

Being a travel writer, I have to name Brian Barton as my new favorite Dodger. Being well-traveled isn’t exactly a feather in one’s cap in baseball terms. And indeed, the 28-year-old outfielder has seen his share of minor and major league towns since being drafted.

If he never sticks with a big league club, Barton has a promising career ahead of him as an aerospace engineer. I’m rooting that he gets to go out and play for a while before he settles into a desk job.

For a complete interview with Barton see the following story from the Riverfront Times.

Barton is among the 33 players who will make the Dodgers’ trip to Taiwan next week. Of course he is. With experience visiting more than a dozen countries, he’s better traveled than the rest of the roster put together. What’s interesting to me is how little international travel experience the rest of the roster has. From the Dodgers’ PR staff:

SEEING THE WORLD – A survey of the Dodgers’ Taiwan roster reveals that there are several international travelers in the group. Among the more unique places that Dodger players and coaches have traveled are Spain and Morocco (Jon Link), England (Josh Towers), Holland and Cuba (Chin-lung Hu), Brazil and Japan (Manny Ramirez), Belgium (J.D. Closser), Colombia and Panama (Ronnie Belliard), Germany and Italy (Lucas May), Argentina and China (Xavier Paul) and Saudi Arabia (John Shoemaker). Brian Barton is the most seasoned traveler, having visited more than a dozen countries, including Ethiopia and Peru.

-- JOHN ROSENTHAL

Included on the list of players who will accompany the Dodgers on their March 10 trip to Taiwan is Ronnie Belliard. Yes, the same Ronnie Belliard who showed up to camp a couple of pounds over the 209 his contract requires. It’s a pretty lenient contract, however. All he has to do is be 209 or under at any point during spring training. A long flight across the Pacific might be enough to dehydrate the last two pounds out of him.

Others on the Taiwan excursion include James Loney, Manny Ramirez (the optimist says it’s so the Dodgers can keep an eye on him; the pessimist says it’s so he can restock his supply of performance-enhancing herbs), Eric Stults, Xavier Paul, Lucas May, and of course Taiwan natives Chin Lung Hu and Hong Chih Kuo.

On a separate note, Dodger Stadium looked a little bedraggled on Sunday for the college tournament. The signs on the outfield wall looked like they hadn’t been changed since October; there was still a “Postseason on TBS” banner in centerfield.

-- JOHN ROSENTHAL