Former LA Dodger Steve Garvey aims for the wall in U.S. Senate race

Republican Senate candidate Steve Garvey, a former Los Angeles Dodgers baseball player, tosses a baseball to supporters at his election night watch party on March 5 in Palm Desert, Calif. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

In the 1970s and '80s, baseball fans got used to Steve Garvey smashing winning home runs and clutch hits in key games, leading the Los Angeles Dodgers to a World Series victory in 1981. In a baseball career spanning nearly two decades, Garvey was named MVP for the Dodgers and, later, the San Diego Padres.

Now the former first baseman is headed to a very different kind of competition, a runoff election for an open U.S. Senate seat in California against Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff.