All’s Set for Dodger Home Opener : Groundskeeper: 38 Years on Deck

Like other Dodger veterans, groundskeeper Chris Duca knows all about pressure situations: staying up all night to spray the grass green for a World Series, battling the marijuana that sprouted in the outfield after a rock concert, ejecting snakes and foxes.

And, of course, the constant specter of crabgrass.

Still, 38 years after he signed with the club, Duca admits some nervousness over today’s Dodger home opener.

“I’m always a little tense on opening day--a big crowd looking over the field and so on,” said Duca, 69, a short, muscular man built somewhat like a scrappy second-baseman.

Stadium in Shape

With six players on the disabled list, the Dodgers may not be in good shape physically. But their stadium seemed to be in near-perfect condition Thursday, the grass a luxuriant, undyed green, the adobe soil a soft orange-brown, the outfield walls freshly painted in pale blue.

The only oversight appeared to be the lack of an electric fan in the visitors’ bullpen room in right field. Strange, because the home team’s bullpen room in left field was equipped with one.

The stadium was mostly quiet Thursday except for the uncharacteristic playing-field sounds of birds singing and water being sprayed on the Kentucky bluegrass where the outfielders roam.

“It feels great just to walk on the grass,” said John King, 31, of West Coast Lighting, a company that was hired to dress the stadium railings with red-white-and-blue bunting. “It reminds me of Little League days.”

Upstairs, vendor Mary Trumbo was preparing for her 24th straight opening day, stocking everything from Dodger hats to Dodger pajamas in her booth, along with one pair of non-Dodger shoes.

Changes Shoes in Fifth Inning

“They’re mine,” she explained. “I always change shoes in the fifth inning. When I put on a different pair, it almost feels like I’m starting fresh.”

There were also freshly painted signs above the concession stands notifying beer buyers that they would be limited to two at a time (down from four last year) and none after the eighth inning. “A security matter,” a Dodger spokesman said.

While Trumbo and many Dodger employees--including the players--only have to make stadium appearances between March and October, the season for Duca’s three-man crew lasts 12 months.

The grass has to be reseeded in the off-season and trimmed twice a week. Otherwise, what would the neighbors say? And the “skin”--the dirt--has to be watered every day to keep it from becoming too compact.

Adjustment to Los Angeles

Duca had more trouble adjusting to the Dodgers’ 1958 move from Brooklyn to Los Angeles than the players did. After all, the team’s opponents were basically the same. But the groundskeeper had to face a new climate.

Whereas bluegrass suited Ebbets Field all season, Duca learned that it turned yellow in the late summer months here. So he also had to plant a hybrid Bermuda, which would rally in the hot weather.

Then, too, the Angels were using Dodger Stadium in the early 1960s. As was a once-a-year mobile home show. The field just couldn’t take the strain.

“Well, how would you like to be stepped on every day?” asked Duca, seeing things from a grass-roots point of view. “You’d bruise, too.”

Hence, the decision to spray it green before the 1963 World Series against the Yankees. For a groundskeeper, it was the wrenching equivalent of a man deciding to dye his hair.

Grass ‘Is a True Green’

But there was a happy ending. The Angels moved to Anaheim and the mobile home show moved into the parking lot. “The grass is a true green now,” Duca said proudly.

The varmints who make periodic visits are lured by the smell of food. Duca once removed a garden snake that took up a position behind first base.

But in Brooklyn, he also had to collar drunks who ran on to the field. Security police handle that task here. So that’s one breed of wild animal that Duca won’t have to worry about today.

Then there was the marijuana invasion following an Elton John concert in the mid-1970s. “It started showing up about two weeks later,” Duca said. “We just kept mowing it very short and finally it died out.”