Dodgers Start Well, But Still Behind

Aubrey Huff may still be diving hopelessly and ring-leading the circus out in right field. In a series highlighted by the defensive mishaps and blunders of the visitors, the Dodgers opened the season by taking three out of four games from the World-Champion Giants at Chavez Ravine.

And even if he may be inexperienced, a manager like Don Mattingly could be just what the young Dodgers need in order to reach their full potential in the coming years. Not to get too excited and far ahead of the curve, but all early indications point to such when taking into consideration the solid team effort the Dodgers showed in the first series of the season against the defending champs.

It was without question that Joe Torre exuded experience that was palpable on the field by the performance of his Dodger teams in recent years. This undoubtedly was a key factor in the Dodgers overachieving, as they reached the NLCS in back-to-back years in 2008 and 2009.  However, Mattingly just might be that right kind of infusion at the right juncture to propel this good, young team into something that could be great.

On another note, when you consider the whole of the club, managerial potential slides to the background, as the elephant in the room in Dodgertown slides to the forefront – ownership.

Frank McCourt has been as lifeless as a dead chicken this spring, when he was seemingly the cock of the walk in recent springs past, while strutting around in his tie-less, $5,000 suits signing autographs with a plastic smile.

The divorce of Frank and Jamie McCourt was the top Dodger-topic this off-season, as well it should have been. Removed from “marital bliss,” what these two snakes have sucked out of the franchise is borderline deplorable, and they should be chased out of town for their injustices to the public.

Frank has tried to hang onto this team as the divorce proceedings have progressed, for only the sake of what can be logically gathered as the benefit of his own ego.  If the man really cared about the franchise, like he swears he always has and still does, he would let it go for the good of the blue. The transparent reality is, he is your typical politician: constantly contradicting himself and talking out of both sides of his mouth.

What is most disgusting about the whole state of affairs is that divorce court records recently showed that McCourt’s two sons were on the Dodger payroll last season for a total $600,000, even though one reportedly was in business school at Stanford, and the other was working for Goldman Sachs.  Suck out some more of the people’s money, Frank.  This isn’t a corporate tax loophole. We all can see what you are doing.

Regardless of who is in charge, either the current McSlimeball or the ideal Mark Cuban – what overall consistency shows itself on the field will end up all-for-not if the sustainability of ownership doesn’t turn the corner into something that is honest and transparent. Stealing from the die hard fans that will continue to roll through the turnstiles be the Dodgers winners or losers isn’t a good way to earn good graces around town. Simply being the Trump of parking lots hasn’t earned you even a smidgen of credibility here, nor should it, Frank.  Walter O’Malley you are not even a fraction of, McSlither.

Any great franchise starts from the top, and when the height of your organization is cheating for the fraudulent benefit of the inside few at the expense of the unbeknownst, outside many, you might as well forget about baseball and take your scaly act into something like politics, banking or the stock market.

Journeying into the depths of what is still wrong with the Dodgers and their ownership aside, taking down the defending champs in a four-game series is an exceptional way to begin the season if you Think Blue.  Hopefully they will keep this great start rolling, and we shall see if success on the field somehow translates positively and makes us forget about, if even for a second, the utter joke that is happening off of it.