POSTED BY Nick Kapur ON 6:20 am, November 16, 2009 - POSTED IN Diamond cuts, Rant
Look, we could talk about how the Dodgers need a second baseman now that Joe Torre completely alienated Orlando Hudson by benching him in favor of an inferior player down the stretch and in the playoffs, or how the Dodgers need another starting pitcher or two, but why beat around the bush when what the Dodgers clearly need, way more than anything else, is new ownership.
Even before the whole divorce saga exploded, Frank and Jamie McCourt had already worn thin their welcome a long time ago. These are people who forced Ned Colletti add the game’s best catching prospect as a throw-in to the Casey Blake trade just to save a lousy $2 million, but who at the same time were dropping tens of millions of dollars annually on at least 7 massive mansions.
These are owners who have refused to sign even a single one of the team’s young talent to any sort of contract at all, despite the fact that this is the obvious way to secure the long-term competitiveness of the franchise while keeping fan favorites in the fold, instead going to arbitration every single year with every single one of them.
These are owners who doubled down on Ned Colletti, giving him a secret contract of undisclosed length and size “in order to prevent speculation,” apparently not realizing that the best possible way to encourage speculation of all types is to give someone a secret contract, and all this in spite of the fact that almost all of the success the Dodgers have had recently is because of Logan White and Kim Ng and Joe Torre, and actually in spite of Colletti’s “efforts.”
Frank McCourt is the kind of owner who likes to show up in the press box in the middle of a game to “chat” with Vin Scully, blathering on and on about nothing, sometimes for innings at a time, when we are all trying to watch the game and would much rather be listening to the greatest sports broadcaster of all time.
These are the kind of owners, who used money they didn’t even have to buy one of the most storied franchises in baseball, with one of the largest fanbases and revenue streams, and proceeded to run it like it had the revenue stream of the Devil Rays, all while extracting as much income out of it as they could to support their lavish lifestyle.
And yet, instead of recognizing what an incredible stroke of luck they had to get their hands on such a team, and doing their best to keep it, they let their marital troubles spin out of control to the point where probably neither of them will keep the team, and in the meantime the a huge cloud hangs over the whole franchise. Because if you thought the McCourts were loathe to spend money on the actual team before, just wait til you see how little they spend now that they need every last penny to pay their lawyers.
In short, what the Dodgers need more than anything is new ownership, as soon as possible.
