Although it’s one of those little known facts that nobody really cares about, veteran entertainment writer and longtime Dodger blogger Jon Weisman and I are connected for life. Not by any great or historical event, but by a 2009 made-for-DVD documentary movie entitled Bluetopia – The L.A. Dodgers Movie in which Jon and I were featured, among many others. The movie commemorated the Dodgers incredible 2008 season, their 50th in Los Angeles, and includes Clayton Kershaw’s MLB debut and the arrival of Manny Ramirez, who almost singlehandedly led the Dodgers into the 2008 postseason.

Jon Weisman

Being featured in a movie with Jon Weisman undoubtedly meant a lot more to me than it did to Jon – after all, Jon was a well established journalist and Dodger blogger and I was just a Dodger fan, albeit a lifelong Dodger fan and longtime Dodgers season ticket holder. But even before Bluetopia, I had followed Weisman’s popular Dodger Thoughts blog site from its very early days and I always admired and enjoyed his work and his writing style – so much so, in fact, that he was one of several writers who inspired me to create the ThinkBlueLA blog site that you are currently reading (and hopefully enjoying) right now; along with Eric Stephen, Tony Jackson and Evan Bladh, who also inspired me and influenced my writing style.

By now most Dodger fans are well aware that Jon Weisman recently left his position with Variety Magazine to take on a full-time job with the Dodgers in a position officially titled Director of Digital and Print Content, a position which will undoubtedly encompass a wide range of assignments including the monthly Dodgers Magazine and other Dodgers publications. But what it will also encompass and what Dodger fans will undoubtedly most enjoy is the new Dodger Insider blog site which launches on Monday, January 6, 2014.

“The mission remains essentially the same as Dodger Thoughts,” Weisman recently told Dodgers MLB.com beat writer Ken Gurnick. “I’ll still be trying to offer insight in a number of different ways but I intend to continue my style of writing.”

Weisman made it very clear, however, that he has absolutely no intention of making the new Dodger Insider site a knock-off of Dodger Thoughts.

“There will be a comment section,” Weisman told Gurnick. “When you go to a game, you talk baseball, but you also talk life. I want it to be a community, a bonding with each other. I’m not replicating Dodger Thoughts here, that’s impossible. I want to do as much of what Dodger Thoughts did as possible, but (the new Dodger Insider) site can offer a lot more. And the access – well, with Dodger Thoughts, if I had one interview with Ned Colletti, I’d call it a year. Now I can take advantage of a ton of access.”

With the Dodgers recently being named the top social media team in all of Major League Baseball and with the addition of Jon Weisman to their already top drawer communications and public relations staff, there is little doubt that the Dodgers will continue to be on the cutting edge of today’s social media-driven MLB world.