O'Malley's sticking point was that he needed a new stadium, and to get a new stadium he obviously needed a place to put it. And there he ran into an insurmountable obstacle: Robert Moses, head of the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority. Far from a lowly bureaucrat, Moses was quite simply the most powerful figure in city government. His rise to power (and his abuse of such) is chronicled in the tome The Power Broker by Robert A. Caro. O'Malley needed Moses to condemn a sizable area so that the Dodgers could construct their new, domed stadium. Moses refused.
In this, perhaps, we have found the true villain in this affair. Moses sabotaged the city committee to develop a plan for a new stadium and often set outrageous conditions which he knew full well O'Malley couldn't accept. After the Dodgers left, it was Moses (with the help of poison-pen baseball writers Dick Young and Arthur Daley) who cast O'Malley in the role of the evil businessman.
This is the account that has survived, more or less, to the present day. But it is simply not supported by the facts. Despite the league-wide boom in baseball attendance, the Dodgers actually saw their attendance decrease steadily from its peak in the late 40's. In 1955, the year they won the World Series, the team barely drew one million fans (The 1948 club drew nearly 1.4 million, despite finishing 3rd). If Brooklyn fans were hopelessly devoted to the team, they weren't too eager to watch them play.
O'Malley keenly recognized the trend and feared that it would only get worse. Ebbetts Field was falling apart. The "white flight" was on, as Dodger fans fled to the suburbs were replaced by lower-income fans, often immigrants, with less disposable income. This change in the racial and social climate of the neighborhood also made whites reluctant to attend games there, especially since there were laughably few parking spots around the ballpark.
On the other coast, gangs of public figures and civic groups were positively clamoring to bring baseball to California. They painted idyllic pictures of baseball in the sunshine and promised numerous economic and practical benefits in order to entice a major league team. Most importantly, though, is that the California boosters weren't committed to the Dodgers. If O'Malley didn't move to L.A., someone else would -- and soon. If O'Malley was beaten to the punch by Cal Griffith (who was desperate to move his Senators), then he'd have lost a chance at great glory and even greater profit.
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