L.A. Times: Joe Beimel longs to make his home in L.A.

Reporting from Washington—Joe Beimel has a plush terry-cloth robe in his locker. Leather sofas to stretch out on in a spacious, wood-paneled clubhouse. A $611-million ballpark that’s become his own eighth-inning playground.

None of it can match the comforts of the home Beimel wanted to make in Los Angeles with the Dodgers.

“I wanted to go back,” the former Dodgers reliever said Sunday before his new team, the Washington Nationals, pulled out a 5-3 victory over the Atlanta Braves at Nationals Park.

Beimel loved L.A. so much he spent his first off-season anywhere outside of his native Pennsylvania there last winter and has put in a bid on a home in Playa del Rey.

But the Dodgers didn’t love him back, not after the way the left-hander struggled against left-handed hitters last season. After hitting .188 off him in 2007, left-handers batted .278 against him in 2008.

And so Beimel never received an offer from the Dodgers and had to sign a one-year, $2-million deal with the dreadful Nationals. There is an upside, however, to playing for the team with the worst record in baseball.

“I like the way I’m being used here,” Beimel said. “If we have a lead going into the eighth, I’m usually in there. The only problem is, we haven’t had a lot of leads going into the eighth.”