Arcadia resident Pete Bonfils, longtime batting practice pitcher for the Dodgers, got a huge Page One spread today in the Los Angeles Times.
“I’m in a daze,” Bonfils said this morning.” I can’t believe it. I figured the reporter couldn’t sell the story to his editors and it wasn’t going to run. Then this. I don’t know what to say. It hasn’t sunk in yet.”
The seed for today’s feature, which included two pictures, was planted a little over a year ago when ArcadiasBest.com blogger Larry Stewart, a former Times sports columnist, introduced Bonfils to baseball beat writer Kevin Baxter, who wrote today’s outstanding feature.
Around the same time, on Aug. 11, 2009, a blog Stewart did on Bonfils, including a video interview and tour of his impressive collection of Dodger memorabilia, was first posted on ArcadiasBest.com. Not long after that, another Times staffer, columnist Chris Erskine, wrote a short item about Bonfils, who was subsequently also featured on a Dodger pregame show on Fox Sports Prime Ticket. Earlier, Bonfils was featured in a 2009 Dodger DVD titled “Bluetopia,” which looked back on the 2008 season.
Stewart, a close friend of Bonfils, said it was approprate that today’s Times feature appeared on Labor Day. “That blog I did last year on Pete, a truly great guy, was a real labor of love,” he said.
Click here to read Stewart’s August 2009 blog about Pete Bonfils.