When Dallas clinched their NBA Finals series against the Miami Heat, fans and media began to bring up Cuban’s name again in relation to the dumpster fire that is currently the Dodgers’ ownership. On television, radio, and across Internet blogs, Dodger fans are practically begging Cuban to be ready if and when the Dodgers are taken over by Major League Baseball and, God willing, sold.

Maybe the most direct plea to Cuban has been through a website titled Mark Cuban Save the Dodgers, created by Los Angeles native and West Covina resident Roger Arrieta. A web designer who started MarkCubanSaveTheDodgers.com, Arrieta created the site two months ago. During the past week, he says, hits on the site have grown exponentially. On Tuesday, there were 800 “likes” on Facebook and as of Thursday night, there were about 1,250.

“My initial thought was ‘save the Dodgers’ as a general idea,” said Arrieta. “Later on, Mark Cuban came to mind. He’s had ten years of success [in Dallas] and he is someone with instant recognition.”

Arrieta’s site features pictures of Cuban with Dodgers gear on, along with images of past Dodger greatness like Sandy Koufax, Fernando Valenzuela, and Kirk Gibson. His Dodgers Fansmanship goes back to the 70’s and 80’s, and his goal is to help encourage an owner like Cuban to take the reins of the Dodgers, an organization clearly in turmoil.

Being a die-hard Lakers fan doesn’t give him any pause either, despite Cuban’s Mavs knocking the Lakers out of the NBA Playoffs this season.

“It doesn’t deter me,” said Arrieta. A lot of people can’t get over that, but it’s simple. You have to look at what [Cuban] has done. Show me a Dodger fan who wouldn’t want that same success for the Dodgers.”

HOW MANY OTHER TEAMS HAVEN’T MADE THE WORLD SERIES SINCE 1988?

Arrieta discusses Cuban’s potential ownership like it’s a done deal already.

“He’s going to do everything to make the team better,” he said.

Having been to many games at Chavez Ravine this year, Arrieta has definitely noticed a difference.

“There are so many less fans this year. It’s crazy,” he said. “It’s not even packed on bobblehead night.”

He has also noticed the increased police presence and it makes him (like Fansmanship) sad that the additional security is needed.

For Arrieta and most Dodgers fans, a failure by current ownership to act at crucial times is an unforgivable offense.

“The Dodgers were never even in the discussion for Cliff Lee or Halladay. They didn’t build on the LCS. They didn’t add to the roster,” he said. His voice a combination of disgust and sadness. “Even if it took [Cuban] 10 years like the Mavs, we haven’t had a championship in 25 years.”

Actually the number is 22, but the point is well taken.

SAN LUIS OBISPO – BLACK OR BLUE?

For him, and so many other Dodgers fans, the McCourt reign has been untenable.

“He said that even if he wasn’t in financial trouble, he’d still be doing the same thing. That’s not acceptable.”

The lack of non-Manny-related big splashes, a penchant for spending money inappropriately and then blaming everyone but himself, and an ego the size of Los Angeles have all marked the McCourt era. For the sake of Arrieta, this writer, and Dodgers fans everywhere, here’s hoping for an end to this situation sooner than later.

WHAT’S REALLY GOING ON AT DODGER STADIUM?

Things may have to get uglier before they can get better.

The picture of Mark Cuban on Arrieta’s website sure looks pretty right about now…

owen@fansmanship.com

Ranting to the world is another. Recently amidst the buzz of political push and pull, budget head and conservative Paul Ryan, Tweedle Dee’d in a speech about poor people.

The Governor said the budget cuts are meant “to ensure that America’s safety net does not become a hammock that lulls able-bodied citizens (the poor) into lives of complacency and dependency.”

Really Mr. Ryan,  a hammock? Last I checked the lower income elderly might need an occasional doctors visit. Or children under five in the inner-city just might benefit from the language programs of First Five.

Hammock? Wrap it in a bit of Christmas tinsel while you’re at it. It is not as if life might be difficult living on a food stamp allotment of 4.46$ daily, per individual.

I mean come on; the food stamp bar needs to be set lower. The cut off of $23,800 a year per family is far too high. We all know under two thousand a month for a family of four is a plush kingdom of high-end fortitude.

Gas is nearly 5 bucks a gallon.

A Happy Meal at McDonald’s is nearing six. Where is this figural Hammock?

Like Ryan, another heartless individual recently Tweedle Dum’d himself to fame. Ron Stiegerwald, a contributor for the Observor-Reporter.com, blamed the victim who was nearly beaten to death at Dodgers Stadium by two riled hooligans.

The basis for his argument: the man wears t-shirts and he thinks the Giants are neat.

His name is Brian Stow, a forty two year father of two from Santa Cruz. As of now Stow is still battling for his life in a Los Angeles hospital. Suffering severe brain damage, Stow has had portions of his skull removed to relieve the pressure from his brain.

To think the paramedic’s life is in danger because he roots for the Giants is surreal. But what is more surreal is that Ron Stiegerwald exists.

Atheists now have another reason to doubt the existence of God. If there was one, Stiegerwald would have been born without hands or a tongue and with a tattoo across his forehead reading: I am a crypt/I am in a gang/ I love the Giants / I hate Dodger fans.

But life isn’t fair.

For Brian Stow life has spiraled into the fringes of death, with his two children lilting like a row-boat in a sea of pain, and his wife wondering what side of fate her family will fall into.

You see, life will never be the same for the Stow family. If Brian pulls through, he’ll have to deal with the tedious monsters of learning memorization and compartmentalization all over again, and within a mightily defective brain. His wife will lose her intimate partner, as Brian battles with not only the physical part, but the psychological mess of things like Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

PTSD and other psycho-social disorders lend themselves to biological imbalances, affecting things like relational and sexual intimacy. Anger stems from the inability to relate to others around you, and PTSD sufferers can find themselves with feelings of intense depression. In turn this creates the need to isolate and hide.

For Stow’s children, another form of abandonment can take place. The abandonment of having a father who is “there,” but “not there,” makes children feel unlovable. These feelings of being unlovable not only push children away from their parents, but foster various insecurities inducing addictions to alcohol, drugs, sex, spending, gambling, and many other fascinations.

Getting too real? I hope so.

And now we have to deal with verbal-garbage from a man whose need for popularity has driven him to a serious literary low. Congratulations Ron, you are now the Lindsey Lohan of sports writing.

I am sure Mr. Stiegerwald is willing to tell both of Stow’s children the reason for their father’s suffering. “Kids, he wore a Giants t-shirt and never should have done that.”

When was Baseball a sport governed by the gang banging world? To most of these backward types, a hat, jersey, or jacket is just about the look. Move to the bay area for a day and you will see plenty of kids rocking a Reds hat to match the red sneakers beneath a sagging, oversized pair of jeans.

Is it not Giants country? You would think. But this is not true anymore. In fact, this was never true. Baseball’s conception was at a grassroots level that promoted the middle-class worker. Our great pass-time has always been the crutch in which our fragmented culture leans upon.

Take World War Two for example. Most of our male professionals left the sport to take part in the war, and despite the lack of top notch talent, Americans still craved one thing: baseball. Baseball has always had that ability to pass the time, as three hours go by, hooting and hollering, eating, drinking, and everything else family and friends treasure during economical lows.

Why? This country is concocted by older cultures who valued the family more than anything. This is the reason the gangster era in the thirties and forties took off as it did. We hit the great depression, and the Italians, Mexicans, and Russians, through strong family bonds, built mini kingdoms within the greater kingdom.

Mr. Stiegerwald is badly misinformed believing every fan who wears a t-shirt, jacket, hat, do-rag, wrist band, and head band, to be some immature individual seeking out attention like a fifth grader. In fact I would argue the reason more people wear memorabilia today is because more of it is assessable to the average fan.

Is this the next phase of interrogation? The individuals who dress in anything less than Dockers, tucked in shirts, and tyes?

Even my tough-as-nails red neck father admits he’d adorn a Mickey Mantle jersey. Faulting an innocent person like Brian Stow for a senseless and heartless crime because he wears sports apparel, is similar to blaming the Jews for the Holocaust because they wore bircas.

When will we hold men and women accountable for their horrendous acts, instead of justifying it with some vapid fat tongued Stiegerwaldism?

Soon I hope; soon for the sake of Brian Stow, and the edict necessary to reshape our culture’s morally off-kilt sense of things.