Dodgers select Shawn Green's app for team's startup tech program

Shawn Green once helped the Los Angeles Dodgers win a division title. Now, his old team is helping its former outfielder get a start in the tech industry.

The two-time All-Star's app, Greenfly, was selected by the team as part of the "Dodgers Accelerator" program that rewards five start-ups with investments from the baseball team every year. The companies rewarded often end up being used by the Dodgers to improve their business.

According to Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times, Green's company is designed to help social media teams collect trending discussions and use fan-made content to benefit their work. For the Dodgers and other sports franchises, the app can be used to help social media teams gather and organize fan reaction and videos, Dodgers social media coordinator Matt Mesa explained.

The Dodgers said that Green received no preferential treatment in spite of his on-field connection to the franchise.

"It was a fantastic bonus," Dodgers chief financial officer Tucker Kain told Shaikin. "It just so happens that Shawn is a fantastic entrepreneur that has built an incredible company. Shawn being a former player is icing on the cake."

Green, who hit 328 homers over his 15-year career with the Dodgers, Toronto Blue Jays, Arizona Diamondbacks, and New York Mets, apparently first caught the technology bug during his playing days, and then never let it go.

"I've always loved tech," Green said. "I've always been interested, even when I was in spring training. Every spring, I would go buy a book on coding. I would get through half a chapter and be so fried from long days in the sun that I never got around to learning any of that, but I've always had the passion for innovative technology."