The Diamond Fan

This year once again, the Dodgers (ostensibly a large-market team) stumble into the All Star breat with a losing record.  Only by dint of playing in the NL West, where the other franchises are proving equally inept, do they even have a whiff of a chance of making the playoffs.  Why is it that one of the game’s richest and most storied franchises, playing in one of the largest markets and with resources that would be the envy of any team outside of New York and Boston, has failed to make the World Series in twenty years and have won only one playoff game in that span. Why?

The problem, in a nutshell, is that the front office is totally incompetent.  This year one need look no farther than the outfiled, where Andruw Jones is getting paid just shy of $15 million and Juan Pierre is making $9 million.  Two players whose productivity is equivalent to a late-inning defensive replacement and a fourth outfielder/pince runner, respectively.  $24 million.  There goes your laarge market competitive advantage right there, squandered.  Throw in another $15 million on a pitcher who hasn’t pitched all season and may never pitch again (Jason Schmidt) and $9 million on a formerly great shortstop who had his best season eight years ago (Garciaparra) and you’ve pretty much matched the entire payroll of the Tampa Bay Rays, who would be 9 1/2 games ahead of the Dodgers in the standings right now.  All for essentially zero contribution.  Pretty much sums it up, right there.  Even a highly productive farm system (which the Dodgers DO have, thank God) can’t dig you out of that big a hole.

You could just chalk it up to a bit of bad luck, but the Dodgers have been making these kinds of stupid decisions for years.  Remember Darren Dreifort, and how everyone was looking forward to how the Dodgers would be able to spend that money once it was freed up?  well, now we know: throw it away again on another set of washed-up (or never were) veterans.  Heck you can take it all the way beack to Dave Goltz, who in 1980 the Dodgers made one of the highest paid free agents in history up until that time , only to see him go 9-19 over the next three years pitching for some decent ballclubs.

Add in the fact that they can’t even recognize who ther five best starting pitchers are, and it’s a miracle that Joe Torre and the kids have managed to win as much as they have.

All one can do is hope they don’t totally lose their mind and trade away part of the future (Kemp, Eithier, LaRoche, etc) for yet another retread who will help make it look like “we’re trying to win this year” when all they are trying to do is keep the turnstiles humming until the wheels come off in September.

Play-the-kids! It’s the only way you’re going to make this playoffs this year, next year, or any other year, unless and until you get somebody in the front office that can actually evaluate major league talent.