'I don't know where I'd be without baseball': How the Palisades Dolphins found 'a safe haven' after losing everything to the wildfires

LOS ANGELES -- With their schoolhouse burned down and their tract demolished, Palisades Charter's shot squad gathered astatine Fairfax High connected Friday afternoon, for the finale of a regular play spent wholly connected the road.

One by one, 8 Palisades seniors -- a radical of players who had their mediate schoolhouse graduation upended by the COVID-19 pandemic, past spent their last precocious schoolhouse semester successful nomadic chaos aft Los Angeles' unprecedented wildfires -- spilled retired of the dugout to beryllium recognized. They held roses for their mothers and personalized baseballs for their fathers. Palisades diversion manager Rocky Montz introduced them individually, past paused aft they had each lined up on the first-base line.

"Quite a year," helium said.

Fifteen of the 42 players who marque up the school's shot programme were displaced successful the aftermath of the Palisades fire, which burned for the last 24 days of January and destroyed 6,837 structures on its path. Staging a shot play initially felt impossible. Navigating it required uncommon resilience. Completing it was a adjacent miracle.

The Palisades shot program, among the astir distinguished successful the area, ran its practices retired of nationalist parks and needed support from a rival schoolhouse to big Senior Day. Its docket -- which continues with the commencement of the playoffs connected Thursday -- required playing arsenic the location squad connected 15 antithetic fields. And yet, for a radical of players who present be classes retired of an abandoned section store, this shot season, tumultuous and unconventional arsenic it was, became a much-needed constant. It provided what caput manager Mike Voelkel described arsenic "a sanctuary, a harmless haven."

"I don't cognize wherever I'd beryllium without shot close now," said Ian Sullivan, a elder archetypal baseman and pitcher who mislaid his home. "People accidental it's not steadfast to person thing that you're truthful obsessed with that you can't unrecorded without it, similar it's beauteous bully to person equilibrium successful your life, but with virtually my beingness turned upside down, I don't cognize wherever I'd beryllium if I didn't person baseball."

It'll beryllium astatine slightest different 3½ years until Palisades Charter High School is afloat operational again. Its shot programme is successful superior jeopardy adjacent beyond that; aft the tract miraculously survived the fires, rollers paved it implicit to marque country for portable classrooms successful hopes of getting kids backmost connected field arsenic rapidly arsenic possible. Many of those connected to the programme admit that this could people the Dolphins' past competitory play successful a while, if not ever.

They finished it with a 17-10 regular-season record, punctuated by a mercy regularisation triumph aft 5 innings implicit the Fairfax Lions. The item was erstwhile elder archetypal baseman Roman Hawk sent a shot an estimated 370 feet to left-center field, implicit a 20-foot-tall chain-link obstruction and beyond a achromatic SUV parked extracurricular of it. Hawk was successful tears arsenic helium gave hugs and posed for pictures aft play concluded. He lives successful Brentwood, an country that was not straight impacted by the Palisades occurrence but whose proximity forced him to evacuate twice. In the ensuing weeks, Hawk saw immoderate of his closest friends sorb the nonaccomplishment of their homes and practically each worldly point they owned.

By this point, helium has afloat grasped the value of simply completing this season.

"Each time brought thing new, and we conscionable did it," Hawk said. "I don't truly cognize however we did it; I'm conscionable gladsome we did."

JETT TEEGARDIN, A inferior pitcher and 3rd baseman, woke up connected the greeting of Jan. 7 to a telephone telephone from his mom, who was astatine work, telling him to evacuate their home.

"I didn't instrumentality it earnestly astatine all," Teegardin said. "My biggest interest was that successful similar 3 oregon 4 days we were going backmost to school. I was like, 'I don't privation to spell back.' And past I spell extracurricular and I look up and there's a large unreality of fume supra our house."

Teegardin waited for his ma and his sister to instrumentality home, past threw a brace of sweatpants into a duffle bag, got into his car and spent hours successful standstill traffic. The 3 settled into a edifice 9 miles south, and it wasn't until Teegardin flipped connected the tv and saw flames engulfing Temescal Canyon, which borders his neighborhood, that helium felt the magnitude of what was occurring.

As quality of the devastation spread, Voelkel was flooded with telephone calls and messages from coaches and friends from each implicit the state wondering however they could help. A week later, the California Interscholastic Federation announced it would simplify transportation rules for athletes displaced by the Palisades and Eaton fires, which forced much than 200,000 radical successful L.A. County to evacuate. Players kept wondering if they would person a season.

"Yes," Voelkel would archer them. "I don't cognize how, but yes."

Three of Palisades' 4 azygous sets were destroyed, arsenic were 2 sheds stuffed with tract tools and a laundry database of instrumentality -- radar guns, buckets of baseballs, fungo bats, helmets. Most pressing of all, though, was uncovering a caller spot to play. The Palisades shot field, which sits successful a vessel surrounded by vegetation, was unharmed, but the surrounding harm made it inaccessible.

Voelkel spent his days connected the telephone trying to portion unneurotic a schedule, further analyzable by the information that 3 of the different six teams successful the league didn't person their ain fields. It wasn't conscionable astir securing a venue; it was getting administrators from aggregate schools connected board, booking umpires, making definite parents approved, and coordinating question for kids who were not aged capable to drive. If 1 constituent broke down, the process had to commencement each implicit again.

Most of the destinations required agelong drives, and galore came with unforeseen obstacles. (On 1 occasion, Palisades unknowingly played connected a tract with a curfew that caused the cancellation of a inferior varsity crippled successful the mediate of the 3rd inning.) Practices were held astatine 2 nationalist parks, the 2nd of which was built for 8-year-olds. It had 1 batting cage that was ever occupied. Bucket lids were utilized arsenic bases. Midway through, the locals practically turned the outfield into a canine park.

"Very sandlot," Sullivan said. "It was precise funny, but besides precise frustrating."

Games were played connected weekdays astatine noon oregon 1 p.m., successful the mediate of classes, often the lone clip they could beryllium accommodated. Schedules were emailed to parents each Sunday, but they were perpetually successful flux. Voelkel recalled 1 lawsuit erstwhile it changed a twelve times wrong a span of 3 days.

The hardest part, elder close fielder Logan Bailey said, was "finding the volition to get up each morning, travel retired to the tract and springiness it your each with everything other going on."

But the players drew information from thing bigger.

"We're not conscionable winning for us; we're doing this for the Palisades community," said Joseph Stanley, a freshman 3rd baseman and pitcher connected the inferior varsity team. "It's ace important to the community. They mislaid everything, right? And we're representing it. I instrumentality truthful overmuch pridefulness successful it."

Voelkel has coached shot for astir 40 years, the past 18 astatine Palisades. Under Voelkel, the programme has claimed 11 Western League titles and boasts a .614 winning percentage. From 2017 to 2024, the Dolphins won 72 consecutive games wrong their league. This year, though, players often had to miss signifier and made much unforced errors than helium could remember. But they played. And done that, lives successful disarray had immoderate semblance of normalcy.

"When we would lose, evidently it would devour maine up," Voelkel said. "But past I would person to halt and go, 'That doesn't matter. It does, but it doesn't.' So erstwhile you speech astir the challenges, that was a large situation for me. But the play -- I didn't attraction if we were playing connected the moon; we were playing."

Teegardin was among 8 players whose location was destroyed by the Palisades fire, which grew to go the astir destructive successful L.A. County history. In the 4 months since, helium has gone from surviving retired of a edifice country successful Marina Del Rey to impermanent homes successful Fairfax, Sherman Oaks and Mar Vista, wherever the household is yet settled with a one-year lease.

He misses the small things astir his aged neighborhood. Where he'd parkland his car, conscionable his friends and locomotion his dog. How he'd look retired implicit the bluffs, look toward the formation and wide his mind. In his unreserved to permission the house, helium didn't drawback immoderate pictures of his different mom, Carrie, who died of bosom crab erstwhile helium was conscionable 7. Teegardin finds himself reasoning astir that often.

Baseball has been a welcomed distraction.

"It's the champion happening I person successful my life," Teegardin said. "I'm truthful blessed for the play close now."

IAN SULLIVAN WASN'T yet calved erstwhile Dave Roberts stole the basal that ignited an unprecedented comeback successful the 2004 American League Championship Series and everlastingly turned him into a fable successful Boston. But Sullivan, who was raised a die-hard Red Sox fan, watched each inning of that series, which his begetter had recorded connected videocassettes, each of which were mislaid connected Jan. 7.

Three weeks later, Roberts, present the Los Angeles Dodgers' manager, stood successful beforehand of Sullivan and his teammates and gave a 45-minute pep speech astir the roadworthy ahead. Roberts implored the players not to marque immoderate excuses. He rubbed a manus on 1 of his arms and told them helium had goose bumps reasoning astir the challenges they would encounter, however it would bring them person unneurotic and fortify them forever. He past talked astir however those characteristics helped his Red Sox flooded a three-games-to-none shortage against the New York Yankees 11 years ago.

"He conscionable seemed precisely similar the moments I've seen of him successful bits and pieces connected my TV," Sullivan said. "He benignant of talked astir conscionable however a large league roster does it, however 1 of the champion teams successful the satellite does it. And truthful that was benignant of inspiring due to the fact that he's quality conscionable similar us. And the mode he's talking astir his guys, they're besides conscionable human. It felt encouraging, particularly for america erstwhile we were truly unsure what our play was going to beryllium like."

Roberts exchanged numbers with Voelkel that day, and the 2 texted from clip to clip implicit the ensuing weeks. Voelkel congratulated him connected his record-breaking extension; Roberts periodically checked successful to spot however the squad was faring.

On April 26, Roberts turned his bobblehead nighttime into an accidental to invitation the squad onto the tract to ticker the Dodgers spell done antiaircraft enactment and batting practice. Teegardin threw retired the ceremonial archetypal pitch. Four inferior varsity players whose homes burned down stood down location sheet for the pregame ritual of yelling, "It's clip for Dodger baseball!" into a microphone.

"These are formidable years for these kids," Roberts said. "Sports, precocious school, is simply a large portion of my memories. And truthful I was conscionable precise sympathetic toward these young men that this calamity that happened -- I conscionable was trying to promote them to not fto it specify their precocious schoolhouse years. Because it's not conscionable the seniors, but their schoolhouse is not going to beryllium determination for the foreseeable future. I conscionable didn't privation it to impact their precocious schoolhouse experience. And if I tin hopefully adhd immoderate penetration oregon immoderate hope, that's what I wanted to do."

Sullivan, a elder pitcher who volition play shot astatine Emerson College successful Boston adjacent year, had conscionable dropped disconnected his aunt astatine Los Angeles International Airport connected Jan. 7 erstwhile helium saw a plume of fume supra the hillsides. When helium arrived astatine his home, helium packed his parents' wedding album, grabbed 1 of his shot gloves and near his house, unaware of the information he'd ne'er measurement wrong it again. Now, lone a hammock and immoderate outdoor furnishings remain. Ever since, helium has kept his caput occupied by 1 thought:

Three games.

Dodger Stadium volition big the City Section Finals connected May 24. And if the Palisades Dolphins tin triumph their archetypal 3 playoff games, they'll play determination for the archetypal clip since 2019.

"We got a sensation of it [in April], and I can't get that sensation retired of my mouth," said Sullivan, who has since moved with his household to 3 antithetic places, including their existent spot successful Manhattan Beach. "I privation to play determination truthful bad."

IN THE SUMMER of 2007, Voelkel sold his existent property company, packed a U-Haul and moved his household to L.A. to facilitate his wife's and his son's acting careers. He initially accepted a occupation arsenic the carnal acquisition teacher astatine Palisades and was subsequently asked if helium had immoderate involvement successful coaching the shot team.

The shot tract was a plateau of ungraded and patchy writer with limitless imaginable then. It neighbored the borderline of Sunset Boulevard, the iconic thoroughfare that connects to Pacific Coast Highway, and was surrounded by a 50-foot-high embankment of thenar trees and ivy. "A small spot of Miami and a small spot of Chicago," Voelkel said. Over the people of 2 decades, Voelkel fundraised determination successful the vicinity of $3 cardinal to amended it. In the aboriginal stages, helium rented a location 2 blocks distant and worked connected the tract up to 8 hours daily.

An outfield obstruction and a elephantine batter's oculus was installed. Netting was placed on foul territory. The infield writer was laser-graded. A informing track, a rarity for section precocious schoolhouse fields, was enactment in. The mound was built truthful that it would driblet gradually, 1 inch for each foot, making it much conducive to limb care.

It became 1 of the champion amateur fields successful L.A., and the players worked connected it conscionable arsenic overmuch arsenic their coaches did. They leveled the pitcher's mound and each batter's container aft each usage, dragged sod routinely, lined basepaths earlier games and patched holes erstwhile gophers infiltrated the outfield. It taught them work and ownership, and now, it's gone.

Palisades administrators and the L.A. Unified School District decided to pave implicit it to instal bungalows that volition service arsenic impermanent classrooms for further students. Trucks arrived connected April 24. The field, 1 of the lone parts of the field the fires spared, was leveled wrong 24 hours.

"Devastating," Bailey said.

"It was fundamentally our 2nd home," Caleb Gitlin, a sophomore infielder, added. "There were days erstwhile we'd walk six, 7 hours there. We were determination sometimes much than we were astatine our homes."

Palisades' main campus, which served astir 80% of the pupil body, stayed upright during the fires. But the different 20% utilized bungalows that burned down. Administrators yet decided they would spot caller ones atop a level aboveground created by paving implicit the field, believing it to beryllium the lone spot that could adequately accommodate them.

The determination triggered outrage from parents who judge immoderate of the bungalows volition stay bare due to the fact that they've overestimated imaginable enrollment; that they didn't exhaust alternate options; that the program was approved without consulting those straight involved; and that determination hasn't been capable urgency to find an alternate tract with autumn shot approaching. The reality, though, is that the players were connected the incorrect extremity of a numbers game, with astir 40 of them and astir 2,500 others.

"Just due to the fact that it's a debased fig doesn't mean these kids don't count," said 1 parent, who asked not to beryllium identified. "They've been done enough. They deserved to play shot connected their field."

In a statement, a spokesperson for the LAUSD wrote that the portable classrooms volition beryllium successful spot until imperishable structures are erected, which is "expected" for the 4th fourth of 2028. "At that time," the connection read, "the portable classrooms connected the shot tract volition beryllium removed and the shot tract volition beryllium reconstructed, which is anticipated to beryllium completed successful 2029."

School administrators person told parents that they are committed to maintaining a shot programme astatine Palisades, an independently tally charter that rents its batch from LAUSD. But determination person not been immoderate solutions, making it much and much apt that adjacent play -- and possibly the ones beyond it -- volition beryllium conscionable arsenic nomadic arsenic this one.

"I truly don't person words to explicit the aboriginal of the shot program," said Voelkel, who expects to discontinue earlier a caller shot tract is enactment successful place. "That's astir apt the astir disheartening thing. I deliberation from my standpoint arsenic good arsenic the hundreds of erstwhile players that I person is, 'What's going to hap next?' And there's truly nary for-sure plan. Just immoderate ideas. That's the portion that truly stings is each the clip -- money, support, work, and each the worldly that goes into it, to beryllium successful this spot close present is benignant of a pugnacious pill to swallow."

On April 22, aft 14 weeks of distant learning, Palisades students transitioned into an aged Sears gathering that sits adjacent to the celebrated Santa Monica Pier. The store opened successful 1947 and unopen down successful 2017. Now, 2,500 precocious schoolhouse students inhabit 4 floors, taking classes wrong drywall cubes that don't person doors, each dependable reverberating done the building.

Voelkel was told to tally his P.E. people retired of the parking batch wherever buses load and unload kids, though often he'll locomotion the students astir 5 blocks to a section park. Parents are skeptical astir the administration's extremity of having kids backmost connected the Palisades field by the commencement of fall, believing aboriginal 2026 to beryllium acold much realistic.

The unsettled timeline has lone analyzable the hunt for an alternate shot field. The information that arsenic galore arsenic 5 of the 7 teams successful their league won't person a tract adjacent play has fundamentally near them competing for the aforesaid spaces. And the world of dealing with assorted sectors -- parks and rec programs successful Santa Monica and L.A., LAUSD officials, Palisades administrators, etc. -- has added different furniture of difficulty.

With shot truthful uncertain, kids volition inevitably transfer.

It's different obstacle successful a twelvemonth defined by them.

"It's conscionable a batch to deliberation about," Teegardin said. "Although I bash request to interest astir it, I'm conscionable trying to propulsion it disconnected conscionable truthful I could support my sanity a small bit. But I request to interest astir that. I've decidedly thought astir transferring, but I've thought astir staying. I emotion this school. I emotion Pali truthful much, and it sucks that I person to deliberation astir leaving."