The Benchmark for winning: Jerry Buss’ Lakers

I’m turning thirty this year. Two years before I was born, Dr. Jerry Buss purchased the Lakers. All I’ve known my whole life is the winning tradition of the team. I have early memories of Magic’s sky-hook to beat the Celtics and when Kobe threw the Game 7 alley-oop to Shaq to beat Portland I jumped through the roof of my first college apartment. With the exception of a middling few years in the 90’s, and another set of interesting, if not victorious seasons during the last decade, the Lakers have always been championship contenders.

When the Lakers traded Shaq in 2004, it was the first time I had ever openly-questioned the Lakers’ decision-making. At the time Shaq was flirting with being my favorite Laker. Ever. He still might be.

I prognosticated to anyone who would listen: “If they don’t win another champi0nship within five years, they will decline, Kobe will asked to be traded, and we’ll be back to a time worse than the mid 90’s.”

It took Kobe less than 5 years to demand a trade, but the Lakers ignored his plea, got back to the NBA Finals in 2008 and won title each of the past two seasons. The Lakers did what it took to win with savvy trades and a willingness to go over the salary cap when necessary to ensure a complete roster. Dr. Buss’ team didn’t just quietly develop a culture over 30-plus years that espoused a winning mentality. When it came time to make roster decisions, or make their product better, their actions matched their rhetoric despite a collective team salary that put them consistently over the cap.

Frank McCourt and the Dodgers

I hate to say it, but the McCourts have become a punchline. The “joke” might go something like this:

“How do you take over 50 years of solid ownership-fan relations, and in just a few years make one of the most beloved franchises in modern professional sports a laughing-stock?”

The answer/punchline, of course, is to follow the McCourt road map.

After winning with low-priced, young talent and benefiting from being at or near the top of Major League Baseball’s attendance for nearly a decade, the Dodgers fell-off dramatically last season. When young players didn’t produce, there were no solid stars for them to lean on. The icon they had come to rely on failed like a used car that ran great for a short while and then became a lemon. Of course, “Man-Ram” did come to the team “on-sale,” and proved the “you get what you pay for” adage when he missed much of the past two seasons due to injury and suspension.

Without their star to lean on, the entire house of cards collapsed like, well, a house of cards.

So what do Dodgers fans have to look forward to? If you listen to the general manager, they could be just like the Giants this year (more on why the Giants are enablers as the baseball season goes on).

Our rose colored-glasses would have us ask the following questions: Why couldn’t the Dodgers, with newly acquired Juan Uribe and John Garland, rely on their pitching and scrappy play to win the division this year? Why can’t they stay in contention for the entire season? Maybe they can even make the playoffs again, and wouldn’t that be good enough make everyone in “Dodger-land” really super-duper happy?

My sarcastic tone comes for a few reasons:

1) For a team from Los Angeles to be out-spent by a team from San Francisco is the baseball economic blasphemy. Dodger Stadium is one of the best-attended stadiums in all of baseball, in the second-largest media market in the country, and the Dodgers are constantly operating under a budget tighter than (you fill in the blank). They tried to win “on the cheap” with the genius from the A’s and when even he couldn’t win under McCourt’s budget, he became a scapegoat and was let go.

2) For the Dodgers to try to “imitate” the Giants, as they have been seemingly for the past decade, is embarrassing. I’m sick of it. And I’m sick of Giant retreads. Schmidt, Kent, and now Uribe. Bleh. ENABLERS!

3) Also embarrassing: The Giants won the World Series last year. Maybe I am not, in fact, really over it. The more I think about it, the more annoyed I get. Anyway, moving on…

Finally, in a city that supports the Lakers with the condition of success demanded from them (the sky was falling in Laker-land before the All-Star break), fans seem to support the Dodgers unconditionally.

Whether or not the ownership makes sound decisions, we will go to games and make ourselves believe that the Dodgers have a real shot. In baseball, this may be a reality, as the Giants proved. But it shouldn’t have to be the reality in a strong market like Los Angeles.

In the spirit of being a Dodgers fan with a new season approaching, here are my baseball season predictions. As you’ll see, my rose-colored glasses are shattered as soon as I look at the Phillies’ roster (why can’t the Dodgers just be more like the Phillies!?).

Before my prediction, I’ll leave Dodgers fans with an image of a different owner. Picture this. Mark Cuban in the owner’s box. Oscar De La Hoya doing real outreach to fans in Los Angeles. Magic Johnson’s genuine smile as the new face of the Dodgers. Somebody with a LOT more money and a LOT more stable of a situation than is currently present. Doesn’t that sound nice?

Owen’s 2011 MLB Predictions –

NL West Champ: Dodgers

NL Central Champ – Cubs

NL East – Phillies

NL Wild Card – Braves

AL West – Angels

AL Central – Twins

AL East – Red Sox

AL Wild Card – Yankees

Phillies over Dodgers, Cubs over Braves, Phillies over Cubs

Red Sox over Twins, Angels over Yankees, Red Sox over Angels

Red Sox beat Phillies in 6 games. Halladay is great, but Lee and Hamels get roughed up.

AL Cy Young – John Lester

NL Cy Young – Roy Halladay

AL MVP – Carl Crawford

NL MVP – Matt Kemp (Had to do it and he’ll have to have an MVP year for the Dodgers to win the West…)

Yep. My rose-colored glasses are intact.

owen@fansmanship.com