Dodger Blues

It's not looking good for LA's favorite baseball team to make the playoffs this year. And no, I'm not talking about the Angels -- as far as I'm concerned, they'll always be from Anaheim. The Good Guys in Blue seem to be hitting a wall just at the wrong time. Wrong time because the front-running Friars of San Diego are hitting their own improbable skid, creating the best opportunity all season to take over the division (or at least get the wild card). But no, not this Dodger team. They seem to want no part of it. There's speculation that the team is suffering under the psychological weight of the just-started divorce proceedings between the owners of the club. Frank and Jamie McCourt bought the team several years ago, mostly by credit and IOU's (a questionable financial arrangement, even by then-credit standards, approved by Major League Baseball in an equally questionable fashion). The once-happy couple is now at odds with each other, accusing each other of infidelity and irreconcilable differences as they wash their public laundry on the front pages and 11 o'clock news. The team itself is currently managed by a former skipper of the recent New York Yankee dynasty, but even he seems to have had enough and may retire at season's end. The general manager is in his first stint at this position, hired by the club from the arch-rivals to the north and therefore will always has his allegiance questioned with every losing streak, and there's been plenty of those to go around. Nothing heals wounds as fast as a winning streak, and if the Boys In Blue pull a 180 and show some actual fight as the month ends, the city will re-embrace these guys as bold heroes that faced adversity like no other -- well except for the Padres to the south, who are (and have been) leading the division by way of smoke and mirrors, having to work with a fraction of the payroll the Dodgers have; or except for the Giants to the north, who are in a close second place with the same payroll challenges, aided by players that were also-rans and cast-offs from several other clubs and therefore are vulnerable to rising (or should I say lowering) to their own Peter Principle. If the Dodgers don't make the playoffs, several huge changes will be in store for them, and we fans (at least the less-emotional and more rational ones) will not be shocked to see surprise moves and/or trades of some of the regular players here that have not lived up to expectations. Not to mention the result of the divorce and the answer to the question of just who will be the owner of the team, and, more importantly, how deep are the pockets the club will be left to work with as they try to field a winning team next year and beyond. And who will be the manager of that new team? The club has a great candidate available and ready in their minor league system, but there's also talk that the current skipper will anoint his protege (and current hitting coach -- did I mention that the hitting has slumped badly lately? but let's not go there) to take over the team, as a return favor to the skipper for agreeing to take over the team in the first place. Only time will tell how this year will affect the club long-term, but in the short-term, there's lots of 'splaining to do...