As an outsider, it is of course hard to say what exactly is the opinion of Bradley in the Dodger clubhouse. We know for sure that most of the mainstream media would have a fit if he came back.

I was going to vote for "c": he's not worth it. But when you think about it, how many teams have guys who play a decent center and can hit like Milt? Ten or twelve? At best.

Dumping Milt would allow JD to slide over to center, which is supposed to help his knee and also increases Drew's relative offensive value.

Tough issue. Maybe his trade value is higher than I suggested in my comment yesterday.

D.

I say that because B seems like a viable answer unless you take into account all the front office drama that makes what ever troubels Kent and Bradley had seem liek they were off picking flowers.

For what it's worth, if you want Drew to play center, you put him in center, regardless of Bradley's presence. Bradley could be put in left or right. That issue is just a footnote.

Im sorry for my sloppy spelling in 2, its just that I am somewhat dyslexic, I'm afraid of heights so I never look up.

A ray of hope on Epstein / wishful thinking... word in Boston is that Theo is having regrets about leaving the Red Sox and he is not being welcomed back. Meanwhile there are 8 groups vying for the Nationals and he's tied into one. McCourt's offer is a bird in the hand. If Theo waits around till MLB settles the Nats sale, he could get left empty-handed. The guy changed his mind on a dime last month- it could happen again.

From afar, it seems that even the most lenient of fans have grown tired of Bradley's act. He seems like a useful player (and a bargain at that), but it would seem that most Dodger fans would choose A.

5 This sounds like an ad for a 1960s movie: "If you like Larry Lucchino, you'll love Frank and Jamie McCourt!"

I hope McCourt is a good salesman. He's got to distract Theo from the problems of the McCourts and focus him on the Dodger mystique, the relatively forgiving fan base, and the revived minor league system which will make him look good in the years to come. Kim Ng needs to be prevailed upon to stay, because she's obviously an asset.

The fear is McCourt thinks he should be selling "McCourt" a la "Trump." That would make any but the most desperate baseball type run fast the other way.

I'm cheating. I say trade Kent and keep Bradley. I love Kent but his value is high right now and a decline is possible if not likely. And unfortunately, I don't see the Dodgers winning anything next year. Bradley is at least somewhat about the future if he can get his act together.

Of course, this is about as possible as trading Kent and Bradley in a package deal for Alex Rodriquez.

They should keep Bradley unless they've got a better plan (haha). More Repko, or Jacque Jones, or Sammy Sosa is not a better plan.

D. His situation is similar to Ricky Williams' at the beginning of the year. Even if you trade him eventually, you don't do it now. It doesn't make sense.

Colletti is the last guy to keep Bradley and trade Kent.

Sidenote from yesterday's Ken Gurnick chat... "What are the chances of the Dodgers bringing up James Loney to fill their void at first base? -- Eric G., Rapid City, S.D.

Void at first base?? And here I thought we had a void at first base from 2000 to 2002.

The only thing that would make me want to trade Bradley is if the reports about his knee are true and he's out until July.

Other than that, his value is massively low for a centerfielder who can hit for power, has plate discipline, and plays good defense.

If there truly was a void at first base, then all the throws from the infielders would have ended up in the stands or dugout.

Jon,

My answer would be a) if it is true that Jeff Kent wants Bradley off the island.

I am not one of those who wants to see Kent traded. Beginning in 2007, the Dodgers will start a 2-3 year phase in which we will resemble the Devil Rays or the Rockies--in a good way! We'll be a team of talented but inexperienced players. The process of finding out which of them are real vs. which of them are smoke and mirrors will require lengthy and patient trial and error. The 2007-08 Dodgers will be a team that casual fans will not love, although DT types will be ecstatic.

So, I think they need to make a run at a division title in 2006 while the getting's good, and Kent is essential to that run. A healthy Bradley would help, too, but not at the expense of losing Jeff Kent. I do not see a scenario where we can trade Jeff Kent at this point in his career for equivalent major league talent--and we really don't need more prospects, unless you're talking Lastings Milledge or Brandon Wood-type talent and readiness.

If the rumors about Kent saying 'it's me or him' are incorrect, then I hope we keep Bradley, rather than accept a handful of beans for him.

Maybe Hee Sop Choi is Annoyed? That he wasnt able to play first that much last year?

14. I'm just wondering how the PR concerned McCourts would think that hiring Ned Colletti is the answer to their problems?

Hopefully Steve Henson's 'sources' are the same ones that told him Gillick, Hart, Hershiser, Valentine, etc.. were all 'leading' candidates.

Colletti just doesnt seem like a very good option, considering what shape his present team is in.

12- Except what can you get for MB with a bad knee? I would non-tender him in that situation. If alongs come May and he's still available...

If his knee is looking good for the start of ST, then I say go to arbitration. Other teams are gonna get the better of us in a trade.

All of this assumes that his problems at home were blown out proportion.

I wonder about the reports on his knee too. I thought last year the injury was exaggarated just to get him off the field. I hope I am right and I hope I am wrong too.

I think Colletti is a diversion.

So long as Steve Phillips is talking about the hole at first base, the Dodgers have a hole at first base.

Never mind that Dodger first basemen hit 30 homeruns and OPSed .825 (which would have gone up about 15 points had not eaten up 75 at bats).

*had Phillips, Grabowski, and Nakamura not eaten up 75 at bats.

Here's a quote for those who might think Colletti would be an acceptable GM: "Who are the Giants looking at to take over first base? . . . . Daryle Ward is on their list of possibles"

http://tinyurl.com/dcs4w

Hiring Colletti is not a PR problem. It's a punchline, at worst. The Giants are our rivals, but not in the same sense that Hitler and Churchill were rivals. If he's a professional baseball man in good standing and can help the Dodgers win, his Giants' background is just a credential. His teams have been pretty good.

I'm not advocating him over Epstein or Ng, but I'm not going to light my hair on fire if he ends up with the job. The Dodgers already have people running the team who make me want to light my hair on fire, and I'm still a fan, I guess.

I think this has everything to do with who the next manager will be. Milton has the skills to become a very good OF sooner rather than later. In the beginning of the year, before his injury, he was having a tremendous year. I think that he is not clubhouse virus. His issues off the field should be left there, off the field and away from baseball decisions. That is, until those issues start to affect on the on-field production. The real issue is how he fits or does not fit with Jeff Kent. We should all remember that Kent has had issues with players before. We might like to think that in all of those cases, Kent was not to blame, but in every scuffle there are 2 sides. Therefore, keeping in mind that Kent will be 38 this year and his numbers seemingly are on the decline, it seems to me that Milton holds the most potential. Also, as far as the "true Dodger" agenda, lets not forget that Kent is a "true Giant."

This gets me back to my original point: if Milton is under the guidance of a manager that believes in him (as Tracy does, I might add) and has control of the club house, then Milton's huge potential can be realized in a Dodger uniform with (or without) Kent on the same team. It just seems too easy to give up on a guy that could really help this team (that is need of a lot of help) and who comes with such a cheap price tag. Remember, we gave up F. Gutierrez to get him and we certainly will not get equal value for Milton in a trade.

20 These are the same people that think the Angels had a solid everyday guy at 1b.

Can anyone name a single Giants hitter under 30 that has blossomed under Sabean/Colletti? And please don't say Feliz. The Schmidt trade was one of the best of the past 10 years, but I can't come up with their second best move.

25 I did this not too long ago, and if you look at the beginning of Sabean's career, it's amazing. This goes up until about 2002, and since then, I don't think he's come out ahead in a trade. (Except Randy Winn)

B

If we were talking about the domestic stuff alone I'd say give him the benefit of the doubt. If we were talking about him going public with his frustations over Jeff Kent I'd say it was an isolated incident. But you have to take those two major events and couple them with the various episodes from 2004 and what you have is a big ball of discontent waiting to explode again.

I think Bradley will come back from the injury and be a solid centerfielder for some team. And for a while the Dodgers will be sorry that he's gone. But soon enough he'll break down and embarass the club he's with yet again.

If we are to believe what Milton says then LA was the best fit for him. He loved coming home. He considered Jim Tracy to be a father figure. He loved representing the Dodgers. He had the respect and backing of the owner and GM. He was given special perks such as walking out Jackie Robinson's widow. Etc. Yet after all that he still couldn't pull it together. He still threw his manager under the bus by going public with his problems and allowed his domestic issues spill over into the press.

Milton is baseball's version of Terrell Owens. He has all the talent in the world and there will always be a team that says he can work in their system. But at the end of the day nothing will be perfect and Milton still doesn't respect authority or understand how to control himself.

The 2005 Dodgers were a joke. Both on the field and off. That's why Tracy had to go and why I don't feel bad that DePodesta is now gone too. But in 2006 I'd rather have a 72-90 team that I can respect than a 100-62 team that I had to cringe every time I opened a newspaper.

The Dodgers should use this offseason as a time to clean house. From the GM all the way down to the bench. They should set a higher standard without Milton.

I like Bradley as a player, but he's merely good, not great. He has potential to improve, but not hugely. I'd be surprised if his career OPS were higher than the low .800s. It was .834 last year. His best year was 2001, when it was .922 in 101 games. His career number so far is .776. He'll be 27 in April, so he's nearing his peak. Yes, he plays a better-than-average defensive CF. As a CFer, I'd say he's valuable despite the annual injuries. As a corner OFer, not nearly so much. So if Drew can play CF, then Bradley should be traded for a true bopper who can be adequate in LF. Manny/Burrell/Giles.

Bradley will be lucky to put together one All-star season (if he catches lightning in a bottle and stays healthy). He's good, but he's not likely ever to become great.

28 Bernie Williams OPS'd .837 at age 25 and peaked at 29/30. His HR jumped from 18 to 29 at age 27. Bradley was on this exact track when he went down in late May. Bradley will be a force for the next 5 years for someone IMO.

Pujols won the MVP over Andruw. Good good good. Andruw shouldn't have been in the top 5, but at least he didn't win on gaudy HR totals alone. (I don't mean that he didn't have a great year, just that the only way in which he surpassed the other contenders was the HRs.)

Minor update about Brett Butler up top.

And another update - a Register columnist defends the McCourts

Butler is on former Dodger I would hope would not rejoin the organization. There was just something about him that didn't ring true about him with me. And it wasn't the Mike Busch situation. I think his public persona was a lot different than his private on.

This is all just speculation on my part.

I'm waiting for the inevitable Plaschke column about how the Dodgers are turning their backs on their history ....

For me, it was the Mike Busch situation. And some of the weird parting shots with Piazza, though I'm really vague on recollecting the gist of that. I liked him otherwise. He's neither among my favorites or my least favorites.

29 Well, other than Bradley's age-25, which is now starting to look anomalous, Bernie has been better at every age, and much more durable. Note below that Bernie's age-25 year was the strike-shortened 1994, and I've ignored Bradley's 20 PAs with Cleveland after he was traded from Montreal in his 2nd year.

The numbers are OPS/Plate Appearances. The only year in which Williams missed serious time was at age 34 (and last year).

Age Williams Bradley
22 .686/374 .613/172
23 .760/293 .624/242
24 .733/628 .723/358
25 .837/475 .922/451
26 .879/648 .786/597
27 .926/641 .834/316
28 .952/594
29 .997/578
30 .971/697
31 .957/616
32 .917/633
33 .908/699
34 .778/521
35 .795/651
36 .688/546

34
Vin Scully was usually effusive in his praise for Butler. I don't believe Butler was a big fan of female reporters in the locker room. I wonder if that would make him unlikely to ever consider for working for a team like the Dodgers which has: 1) women in the front office and 2) at least one female beat reporter.

Maybe Colletti will bring Butler in under the banner of implementing the Giant Way. I think this guy is available too:
http://www.drodd.com/html/wendell.html

32 Smith's point that the McCourts should be given time to learn from their mistakes is a fair one, but not one I will buy until I see them actually begin to correct rather than repeat their mistakes. A good place to start would be to hire back Depo as GM.

For the Dodgers to get value for Bradley, they'll have to re-sign him and wait until spring training when he proves his knee is sound, rather than non-tendering him.

That said, I want him gone yesterday. The baseball-related drama -- clashes with teammates, media, fans, manager -- I could handle. But once you throw in the domestic violence allegations, he becomes a garden-variety thug who's impossible to root for or to justify defending.

At least one columnist doesn't want Colletti for the job:
http://www.dailynews.com/sports/ci_3216140

To me the Bradley question boils down to money. Healthy he's worth about $4 million a year, but he'll be out for about half the season. So if he will sign for $2 million or less, sign him up. If he wants more, send him packing.

Just doing my daily duty. From Washingtonpost.com chat w/national baseball writer Les Carpenter:

Washington, D.C.: Some (cough, Svrluga) have suggested that Juan Pierre would make sense for the Nationals. He's now a Cub. So what's your guess? Who who who will be the Nationals Opening Day starting centerfielder?

Les Carpenter: Yeah the Nats never had a chance with Pierre, too bad because I love his game. I would say there is still an excellent chance Brad Wilkerson is the opening day centerfielder, though hopefully not the new leadoff man. Unfortunately the Nationals hands are tied when it comes to making moves. All the hopes of significant upgrades that were discussed in the waning weeks of the season have to be discarded. By the time an owner comes along the market will have been picked clean. This means Washington is going to have to take chances again, hoping to strike gold.

Two possibilities -- Dave Roberts ( a great defensive player and base stealer but one with a surprisingly low on base percentage for a leadoff guy and bad hamstrings) or Milton Bradley (who will come cheaply but with plenty of baggage).

33 Butler is on former Dodger I would hope would not rejoin the organization.

Like a piggy-back ride?

35 Bradley has OPS'd .842 over the past 3 years (1,400 PA's). Only 3 CF in the majors topped that this year: Griffey, A Jones and Edmonds. Even if Bradley plateaus from here he's extremely valuable. Course you have to just let Milton be Milton.

The updates continue up top. Kazuhisa Ishii is a free man.

43

The power of the letter "e"

I would be surprised if Ishii didn't head back across the pond.

Hey Bob T

I've got an OT question in one of your areas of expertise. My wife and kids were at the Whittier Public Library last night. A poorly stacked row of books fell and pinched my 3 year old's fingers and she cried. In less than one minute the security guard came into the Children's room and told my wife that she had to leave, without even trying to evaluate the situation. She refused and he backed off. But a little while later, he berated her again after the clerk asked her about her visit and she shared how upset she was by the way she was treated. Her books were on the counter waiting for check out and he told her that she was holding up the line and had to leave.

Is it common practice to kick out three year olds of the library? Who would you recommend that I speak to at the library? Head librarian? Administrator?

Sorry for the DT interruption. Now back to our regularly scheduled programming.

AP reporting that MLBPA, the Commissioner and Congress have agreed to up the suspensions for steroids to 50 games (1st offense), 100 games (2nd offense) and "sayonara" (third offense).

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2224832

48

Talk to the head of that branch. Then the director of the library. They should be able to sort everything out.

Be calm about it. Ask to see written policies about behavior in the library.

I updated the Ishii update. The Mets' decision was costly financially ... for the Dodgers.

Just read the Marcia Smith column. I found this funny:

"Not all of Frank McCourt's practices are off-base. He delegated some duties to people he trusted: family members. Jamie, an MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management and a law degree from the University of Maryland, serves as president, managing business operations. Their son Drew, who has interned all over the team for two years and has an astrophysics degree from Columbia, is the club's new marketing director."

It was going so well, until she revealed that the marketing director has an astrophysics degree.

I see where Marcia Smith is coming from. Everyone deserves a learning curve. She doesn't seem to pull many punches, i.e. she's not defending anything the McCourts have done (except that dumb Ross Porter comment, although it's fair to say he did have detractors).

But just because everyone needs a learning curve doesn't mean everyone learns what they need to learn. There are plenty of reasons for pessimism, including the overemphasis on PR (that's a trait not easily shaken), the Trump-like insistence that they and not the team were the "brand," and then the very negative impression McCourt made during his press conference firing DePo, during which he looked lost, confused and said things I found to be dishonest. Sure, McCourt could change and become a great owner. 20-1 against.

I wasn't aware an organized dump-McCourt movement was out there. Jon, do you know anything about it, who's behind it, etc.?

Jeff Kent received one fewer vote in the NL MVP balloting than Trevor Hoffman.

Jose Reyes got one vote.

46 To others, they are annoying typos. To me they are found art.

When I was a kid, my favorite part of the New Yorker (since I didn't understand the cartoons) were the little space fillers at the end of columns where a typo or poorly-constructed sentence would leave a surreal impression in my mind that could make me laugh for hours.

53 - I don't know anything about an organized movement.

I agree with your comments, basically.

The thing about the Ross Porter comment that bugged me - because he certainly did have his detractors - is that she seemed to go out of her way to single him out. And whatever his flaws might or might not be, he certainly has been punished enough.

Last bit from the chat, but we've got a real MB booster here. There's a lot of GM stuff, Theo rumors, etc. in the chat if you're intersted -- washingtonpost.com, then scroll to the list of chats at the bottom and click, um, "baseball."

Alexandria,Va: Hi Les, do you think that the Nationals will get a leadoff man, a powerhitter, and a power pitcher and by the way when will we have a new owner without Bud saying by opening day.

Les Carpenter: Again, I think the new GM will have to be very clever this offseason. The Nats are further hurt by the lack of great prospects to trade in hopes of landing a big bat. Say they wanted to get in the Carlos Delgado sweepstakes, what do they have to offer? The same goes for pitchers. Forget any dream of Billy Wagner or B.J. Ryan or Kevin Millwood. The Nats are going to have to pick the waiver wire clean or look for bargains elsewhere. Again, let me suggest the best player available to them might be Milton Bradley

When Jimmy Rollins dies, his obituary might say that in 2005, he was voted the 10th-most-valuable player in the National League.

It probably won't, but it could.

1. Source (Rick Wilton)- "needed surgery in Sept to repair a partially torn left patella tendon. Fortunately he did not need surgery to the ACL or MCL. Early offseason reports indicated he should be ready for spring training. Its unlikely he'll be ready 100% until very early in the season."

2. Last year the Dodgers were an outfielder short as they went into the year with Drew/Milton/Werth/Ledee. Now that they have signed Jose Cruz I think it would be safer to start the season with Drew/Milton/Cruz/Werth/Ledee and have D Young/Repko learn the OF in AAA while waiting for anyone or all of the above to get hurt.

3. If you can trade MB and get fair value then make the deal. If you can't then try to keep him and sign him to an incentive loaded deal. If you can't sign him and it goes to arbitration you might as well non tender him. The reason being that you will need to create a case in arbitration as to why he should get xxx amount of dollars as oppossed to what he wants. I don't think someone like MB will react well to the negatives that will be brought up in arbitration. Negative reinforcement does not seem to work for MB.

4. If the players besides Kent have a problem with Milton then trade or non-tender him.

5. If the problem is only Kent then whoever is the next GM needs to do a better job then Depodesta/JT did in handling the situation and try to get both sides to understand the team is better if they both pull on the same rope. If that can't happen then I'd trade both of them to different teams cause I don't want either of them on my team.

6. MB is a good player but his career path will be Carl Everett not Bernie Williams. That was for you Icaros:)

some MB trades i would do:

bradley and odalis + 4mil for odalis SB for brad wilkerson

bradley+ brazoban for oliver perez

bradley for tyler clippard and eric duncan

what other teams are interested in bradley?

David Eckstein got a sixth place vote and finished ahead of Jim Edmonds and Andy Pettitte.

Dodger Blues is also advocating Kim Ng for GM.

That chat I've been citing took an ugly turn at the end with an "aren't the Dodgers a mess" question and some unpleasant language from a commenter towards Ng and the wirter towards HSC. Yick.

Scott Eyre got a 10th place vote! Is his dad in the BBWAA?

David Eckstien had 27 win shares in 2005 the same as Morgan Ensberg and one more then Furcal or Tejada. He had a hell of a year.

whatd they say about NG and HSC sam?

60
Nate I'm with you in advocating for Oliver Perez but remember his agent is Boras so no sense in getting attached to him if he comes this way.

Ah, the Choi as clutch hitter debate. Cue Jason Phillps ...

https://dodgerthoughts.baseballtoaster.com/archives/223772.html

66 - Sam got me nervous that something truly racial had been spat out, so I looked at the chat:

*

Seattle, Wash.: The Dodgers seem to be a real mess. Are they really going to hire a woman GM? What is their obsession with Hee Seop Choi? Do they have a chance to make Sandy Koufax proud again?

Les Carpenter: Yes the Dodgers are indeed a mess and there is a very real chance they could hire their asst. GM Kim Ng as soon as today. At this point, with Theo Epstein seeming to back off the job, the only candidates are Ng and the Giants Asst. GM. From all indications Ng has done an excellent job as an assistant and would be able to negotiate contracts. And since it seems half the GMs in the game today never played professional baseball, that shouldn't be held against her either.

Hee Seop Choi will probably never be a regular in LA. His defense has been poor and they never believe he will develop into a clutch hitter

According to win shares Jeff Kent had his 2nd best season ever with 28. Only his MVP season was better. 19th place!!!!

Nate -- Commenter said "are they REALLY going to hire a woman GM" (my emphasis) and writer said that Choi plays bad defense and is unclutch (hence Jon's 68).

It was interesting that the writer chose to respond to the slur on Ng by addressing the question whether a GM needs to have played professional ball (and arguing that a GM does not so this shouldn't be held against her).

Ah, the clutch hitting debate. But will he take a walk in a clutch situation? How come no one ever asks that question?

65 How did he pull that off? He OPSed .758 and was very average defensively (100 rate2, 0 RAR2). I don't see how that translates into more win shares than Tejada.

Hee Seop Choi will probably never be a regular in LA. His defense has been poor and they never believe he will develop into a clutch hitter

pshhh, choi will prove them wrong next year.

hope springs eternal!

I want a GM that realizes there's no point going after a big name free agent 1st baseman when we HSC there.

Or maybe McCourt will realize HSC is good enough for 1/10 of the cost of a free agent and decide not to get one. Or maybe Konerko will be signed before we get a GM.

its interesting that the washingtonpost guy said dodgers could hire Ng today, implying he thinks she was the front runner.

well i hope hes right and henson is wrong. I dont want colletti as the dodgers GM.

75 If McCourt's 75 million dollar budget is true, then there's no way we could get Konerko. With Ishii eating another 1.1 million, the Dodgers are down to about five million before arbitration.

Henson might be wrong, but it won't because he had worse information that a guy 2,500 miles away. Carpenter is just guessing like the rest of us.

if giles and konerko are going to get around the same money. what would give the dodgers more production out of their buck?

how much more will konerko produce than choi?
how much more will giles produce than werth?

the one with the greatest discrepancy should be where the dodgers upgrade.

IMO, its LF. of course, everyone here at DT probably believes that too and therefore im preaching to the choir.

76 - I interpreted that remark as the writer discussing a possibility, rather than a likelyhood.

I don't think anyone is implying a frontrunnership. If Jamie is indeed meddling as much as some media outlets have implied, forcing Frank to hire Ng but be the first good result of any aforementioned meddling.

It's funny to think of Jamie McCourt as a 'meddler,' though, considering she's the team President and all.

Scott Eyre was one of the better relievers in the NL this year if you looked beyond saves. He did a very good job of stranding runners. And he had an ERA+ of 157.

Jamie McCourt is a "meddler" because baseball franchises are supposed to be run by men and since she's "just a spouse" she isn't supposed to be making important decisions.

She's a "meddler" akin to Hillary Clinton. I think many would prefer her to be more like Laura Bush.

79 - The other thing is we have outfielders that have had injury problems in the past. So the more the merrier there.

Choi doesn't get injured, or with limited playing time, never had a chance to get injured.

But once again, preaching to the choir.

Dear Ned,
Player X - .240/.349/.437
Player Y - .263/.351/.446

Both are 25 year old 1b's with 1,100 career PA's as platoon players. Player Y is David Ortiz when the Twins released him. Please give Player X a chance.

Someone should write a song, "All We Are Saying, Is Give Hee Seop A Chance"

Or RF for when Drew's arthritic shoulder slams into the turf after his knee gives way and he rolls either of his previously damaged wrists:)

Bradley, Drew, Werth, Giles, Ledee, Cruz Jr.

Even if our 2005 starting OF gets injured at the same time again, we still have an OF of Giles, Ledee, and Cruz Jr. Not bad.

86-Which would result in a fractured Goatee.

I think a lot of people have taken the Depo firing as a mandate for the next GM to dump Choi in order to placate the media or fans or whatever.

The cognitive dissonance here is that Choi is a fan favorite. Probably the second most popular player on the team behind Gagne. Did anyone chant the name of Olmedo Saenz or Jason Repko at the stadium last year.

I am not able to get the Marcia Smith column on my computer. I have no wish to register for the New York Times let alone some Orange County newspaper.

I am in favor of getting rid of Bradley but I have real doubts about moving Drew to center. I recall when Drew took over for Bradley last year his knee started to bother him. Center requires a lot more running than the corner outfield spots.

At this time I think it is pointless to wish for McCourt to hire any particular GM. Unless McCourt shows a willingness to stick to a plan there will be a constant shuffle of front office personnel. McCourt seems to me to be very similiar to a stock market day trader. Those folks may have success at times but over the long haul it is not a good way to build wealth.

Stan from Tacoma

89 Didn't you wonder what went through Tracy's robot brain when the stadium was literally shaking with the Choi chants?

bugmenot.com Stan will change your life.

90 - evading registration is what bugmenot.com is all about. Suggest you try it...

27- "...in 2006 I'd rather have a 72-90 team that I can respect than a 100-62 team..."

I had to read that one out loud. It sounds so, so wrong to me.

91- Are these fans chanting Hee Sop Choi? Yes, Will I play our catcher instead of him? Yes, Will I do this knowing there is no acceptable reasoning behind it? Yes.

The fans chanting the name of HSC are:

1. not baseball savvy?
2. not clutch?
3. poor defensive fans?
4. came over from Florida in the LoDoca trade?

Oops, how could I forget:

5. easily confused by unusual angles?

as much as I wanted the HSC chant to win Tracy over, do we really want a manager that makes lineup decisions based on what is popular? I think not. Hee Seop Choi shouldve been playing for reasons besides fan popularity.

94. ya, that quote is just plain laughable, if you want to respect athletes, go watch the Special Olympics. If your looking towards MLB players as role models or heroes, your looking in the wrong place.

84
Agreed, Choi does have a chance to become David Ortiz or at least David Ortiz light.

73
Eckstien's base numbers don't jump out but according to James he created 103 runs for his team. Kent had 105 and Tejada had 102.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runs_created

94If your a Yankee fan and embarrassed about spending 200 million for a baseball team I could understand that thought. I would be embarrassed if we outspent the NL teams 2-1 and won 100 games. I sure wouldn't be a Dodger fan anymore.

98 Choi getting playing time because he's popular wasn't the point. Nobody who remembers as far back as Eric Karros would want that. The point was that there is a perception that Choi is wildly unpopular and that Dodger fans won't be satisfied until they see his name on the transaction wire. That just isn't the case.

Rob at 6-4-2 says the Times says Colletti is the leading candidate. I hope they're wrong.

84. I think that if we keep comparing Choi to Ortiz, we are probably setting ourselves up for dissapointment. True, it could happen, but its far from assured. Really, all that the comparison should mean is that Choi should be given a chance. Choi's most probable upside is similar to the numbers he put up in FLA.

I wonder if perhaps Wallach's approach for Choi was doing more damage than we expect. Wallach wanted Choi to focus on shortening his swing, making contact, and going the other way with pitches. The Yankees tried the same thing with Giambi when he struggled, eventually he decided he was going to try to pull everything any way, and it resurected his career. I wonder if Choi is best off just going with his naturall pull-happy ways. Just a thought, im no hitting instructor.

102 - That's from last night. Nevermind.

101. ok, i guess i just didnt get the point of the previous points. The sports media doesnt really care about "facts" though, I dont really expect anything more from them.

-according to reports, Elmer Dessens is a real hot property, the Royals and Rockies are bidding for his services. If one of those teams is stupid enough to offer him something before the arbitration-offer deadline, and the Dodgers offer him arb., what kind of draft compensation would the Dodger get? Im assuming he's either a class B or C free agent.

From 42, when did Pierre get traded to the Cubs? Outside of some radio reports last night reporting the rumor, I don't see anything about this

105 He's a "B" FA. Also, it's useless to wait to sign Dessens. His value will only go up, and because he already has offers for more than he'd get in arbitration, the Dodgers would be fools not to offer it

#94, What I think he is saying, and I agree with by the way, is that a winning team is not the most important consideration for being a fan. Let's say for a minute that Colletti is the new Dodger GM and he uses his contacts in San Francisco to get Bonds to agree to a trade to the Dodgers for the 05 Jacksonville Suns roster. Again, let's say Bonds is healthy in 06 and has a great year. Further, Colletti signs Kenny Rogers for the Dodgers in 06 and he has a great year. The Dodgers win 100 games in 06 with Kent, Bonds and Rogers leading the way to a World Series championship.

I would rather see the Dodgers finish last than that particular scenario. Winning truly is not everything.

Stan in Tacoma

106. It seems like Dessens might actually get a formal offer, or even sign a contract, before the deadline.

107. Winning isnt everything in life, but this is major league baseball. If you want a warm storyline, or respectable players, or anything like that, MLB (or the NFL, or the NBA), your watching the wrong sports. Large professional sports leagues are about winning and money. The media can portray certain players certain ways, usually to fit into some prefabricated story line, but it doesnt make it true. If you want to see baseball players play for the joy of the game, watch the college world series, or go down to your nearest little league field.

105 Nothing against Elmer Dessens, who I grew to respect this season, but if he's a "real hot property" then that suggests this season's FA market is probably one to avoid altogether. If Dessens is hot, what's Burnett? What's Weaver? Millwood? Wickman? Nuclear meltdown hot? The rumored Matsui signing will have the same effect on hitters like Giles.

There's been some speculation here that McCourt is stalling on naming a GM because he wants to use that as an excuse to avoid the FA market. That's conspiracy-theory stuff. But if the FA market is driving the timing, let it slide, man. Nothing to buy there.

P.S. Late last night I saw a somewhat stale article on SF Gate that the Giants were taking a look at Matt Morris. Colletti wasn't quoted, but Morris' agent was quoted as having spoken to Colletti. I wonder if this means Colletti would go after Morris if he came down here.

107. I'd be more upset about the complete mortgaging of the future and the upcoming barren years than the make-up of the team.

109. That's the silver lining in this whole McCourt mess. Our best case scenario may be one where McCourt cuts payroll somewhat (I thinkt the $75 million predictions are over the top), the dodgers miss the playoffs, and amid the PR hurricane that the McCourts have to deal with, they just give up and sell the team. I hope there exists a scenario with better upside.

I'll add a quote to the Choi/Ortiz talk from the book Mind Game.

"The Twins had taken Ortiz's problems and exacerated them-- chiefly by trying for years to shorten Ortiz's swing. Red Sox hitting coach Ron Jackson, on the other hand, encouraged Ortiz to "load up," drawing power from his bulk. "Think of what it's like to get ready to throw a punch," draw back. That's what I mean by loading up. That's what we had David work on" "

If any of you care, the US is destroying Guatemala 17-0 in the 7th for the Olympic qualifier. No Dodgers involved.

Canada is up 3-0 on Nicaragua. Martin is 0-4 batting 3rd. Juarez plays for Nicaragua but has not pitched yet. The other game has Panama up 11-4 on Mexico, no Dodgers involved

They have Gamedays for these games. Anyone else surprised?

I have a nephew and niece who were born in Guatemala.

Sum total of major league baseball players born in Guatemala: 0

Number of MLS Cup-winning goals scored for the L.A. Galaxy by Guatemalan players: 2

111
A simple scenario with better upside:
1. McCourt hires a GM, doesn't matter who.
2. Spends no money this offseason
3. Makes one simple trade of MB,Yhancy for Oliver Perez.
3. Enters the season with a cheap lineup of
Choi/Kent/Izzy,Robles/Aybar/Navarro
Cruz/Drew/Werth
4. Pitching staff of Penny/Lowe/OP/OP/ Jackson , relief staff of Gagne/Sanchez/Broxton/Kuo/Wunsch/Osorio
Following happens:
1st - Choi plays full time and posts 25/265/375/510
2nd - Kent did what he did last year
SS - Izzy comes back from his injuries to hit like he did in April/May of 2004
3b - Aybar fails - LaRoche comes up in May and wins Rookie of Year by hitting 25/250/340/480
C - Navarro builds on rookie season and quickly become a top 5 catcher in the NL
RF - Cruz shows that he just loves Dodger stadium and posts a 25/250/375/475 line
CF - JD Drew in his walk year plays 140 games and slugs 35/310/420/520 and then signs with the Yankee's for 15 mill a year.
LF - Werth hits in 2006 like we hoped in 2005 with 30/260/340/500
No injuries other then minor aches and pains

Oliver Perez pitches like 2004 and becomes the staff ace.
Odalis Perez says healthy and is a solid 5th starter
Brad Penny - blows out his arm in June but Billingsly is ready by then and combines with
E Jackson - to give us a great RH tandem
D Lowe - average pitcher until Aug when he steps it up and pitches us into the playoffs.

Gagne - in his walk year gives us 40 saves.
Sanchez/Broxton/Kuo combine to give us the best setup innings since 2003.

When the team starts to tire the kiddie corps of D Young / JTD / Martin / G Miller / Orenduff / Hochevar come to the rescue in Sept.
All for around 75 million.

I'd rather see that then your version.

If any of you care, the US is destroying Guatemala

When I read that I thought maybe Guatemala had ill-advisedly, democratically elected a socialist president.

115- That was one heck of a season cant wait till 07'.

Plus the monopoly on OP's. It's like having a monopoly on orange (properties).

I like that scenario though I doubt everybody will perform that well. Still, if only one move is made in the offseason, that'd be a good one to make.

This years OP's would be last years Jasons.

108 -- Large professional sports leagues are about winning and money.

I don't think that's quite right, at least not from the point of view of fans. If that were the case, no one would be a fan and the large professional sports leagues wouldn't exist at all. We have to have a reason to care (and fans aren't making any of the money, so that's not it).

At the very least, you'd need to tweak what you have said to acknowledge that sports, even "large professional sports leagues," are about identifying with winning. If you don't identify with the winners, you don't care about the winning. It's true that we may have to turn sports teams into a vehicle for our fantasies in order to make us care -- that is, for example, we may have to put aside thoughts about the owners/players/GMs primarily being concerned with business and money. But without that suspension of disbelief, without those fantasies in which we and the team become linked, we simply wouldn't care. We need some sentiment to make it work.

For many people, it becomes too hard to maintain that suspension of disbelief if they know too much about and dislike the players they are trying to identify with. We may not all need a "warm" storyline to be fans, but we all need some kind of a storyline that makes us feel good, and for some people it's not quite enough to have it be, "We're jerks, but we won more games than you!"

I don't want to speak for Stan, but it seems to me that this is the kind of thing he's talking about.

BTW,
All of this is of course related to some people's complete rejection of the "inhuman" statistical approach to evaluating/enjoying baseball. For some people, I think, a focus on cold, hard numbers disturbs their fantasies as much as a focus on cold, hard dollars does for others. I don't share that perspective (discovering sabermetrics deepened my appreciation for baseball, and I find myself able to enjoy that and baseball "magic" at the same time), but I can understand it a bit when I think about the issues above. The problem, for me, comes when people become confused and conclude that because an analytical approach distracts from their attempts to fantasize along with and enjoy the game, it also must not work to build better baseball teams.

The new MLB steroid policy is out now. 50 games for first time offenders and amphetemines are on the banned substance list. No mention about automatic drug tests for managers who take the bat out of their best hitters hands by bunting. vr, Xei

I'd take 2 OP's over 4 Ja(y)sons any day.

118 Think Olden Polynice can pitch?

Or Ron Howard (Opie)?

I don't know if the U.S. has ever invaded Guatemala. Normally we just send the CIA in to take care of things when we think they've gone astray. Since Guatemala borders Mexico, that's a little dicey.

115 just made me think of Hochevar. Think DePo being let go hurts our chance at signing Hochevar since Boras and DePo could work with each other and Boras even said he rather talk to DePo over White. I am just hoping for the same ending as Jered Weaver last year.

122 What if the Jasons were Schmidt, Bay, Giambi, and Isringhausen?

In light of the Congressional action on steroids, I would stay a long way from Mr. Giambi.

someone on another board said roy smith was/is on 1540 talking to fred roggin. i wonder what he has to say.

125
Jim Callis said he didn't think we'd sign Luke because that offer we made is now off the table and that the new regime will probably not come close to making the same offer and it will be hard for Luke to sign for less money and admit he was an idiot. I added the idiot part.
Still he doesn't have many options. He can go back in the draft but he won't get picked any higher then he did last year and he won't get anymore money. He has painted himself into a corner and since he went with Boras I've got no sympathy.

I would really like to get Hochevar signed. Hope Boras just realizes he is not going to make more money next year and takes what he can get.

"Henson might be wrong, but it won't because he had worse information that a guy 2,500 miles away."

I have a possibly obvious question regarding the above quote. When is it right to use "That" rather than "than" for comparative purposes? I've been noticing this a lot lately.

My Inclination: Hee Seop Choi is better 'than' Goggs.

Reputable sources: Hee Seop Choi is better 'that' Goggs.

Which is right? Is this like the subjunctive difference between Were/Was?

suns article!
http://tinyurl.com/cohzz

named milb.com team of the year.

"That" just doesn't mean that.

Using "that" in that way is just I typo, I think.

from the article:

Whether or not this championship run is the end for this core remains to be seen. Most of them have been playing together for a few years in the Dodgers system, and this was the first time they were able to carry it all the way through to a title. Martin hopes it's just the beginning. LaRoche would love for it to continue, but knows that baseball doesn't always work that way.

"It's only been a couple of years and it seems like we're really coming together," Martin said. "Hopefully, we can keep this group together all the way up to the big leagues. Hopefully we can carry this attitude up to the big leagues."

"I'll always remember that team," LaRoche said. "Chances are, guys will get separated, whether it's by trade or free agency. I'll always remember it as one of the greatest teams I've ever played on and one of the most talented by far."

colletti will be on my hit list if he pawns these players off.

133 - They want to stay together. We want them stay together. Everybody wants them to stay together!

120. I like and agree with many of your points. Its just that you see so many people becoming trying to make baseball and baseball players something they arent, and they are just setting themeselves up for dissapointment. I try not to buy into the public "persona" of players. They are who they are, humans who play a game for a living. Look at the reaction to Pete Rose, or even Kobe Bryant. People felt betrayed by those guys when they made mistakes that seemed so out of line of who most thought they were.

I think that if you look to professional sports and say, "i'd rather watch a bunch of 'good guys' loose than a bunch of 'bad guys' win" then I think your just expecting too much of the game, becuase the supposed "good guys" probably arent much better than the supposed "bad guys", its just public perception. There is nothing wrong with it, I just think that its too easy to buy into that image, and when that image eventually proves false, what are you left with?

Really, Im just tired of people putting athletes (or anyone else) on some plateau, only to become enraged when their "heroes" cant live up to their impossible standards. Im just going to go ahead and blame this on a close-minded and dimwitted mass media.

132, 134 - yeah, it was just a typo.

Thanks for the 'that' answer. I have seen it everywhere. I work as a copy editor, so I am used to isolated typo incidents. I have seen the 'that' typo in some offputting places. Most recently, I was thumbing through Bernard Goldberg's latest slam piece and lo and behold, there she was again.

That 'that' is a typo is encouraging, I have been changing it for years.

129 I heard the end of the interview with Roy Smith. There wasn't anything earthshattering in there.

He said that he and Kim Ng were not given marching orders to trade Bradley, though they listened to a lot of offers. Nothing specific.

He also had lots of good things to say about Ng. One comment that I thought was interesting but maybe it was just grammar. When Roggin asked him about how Kim Ng would handle the pressure of being a woman GM, Smith said that she is ready to handle the job, rather than she would be ready to do it. Maybe I am reading too much into it.

By the way, is this the same Roy Smith that pitched for the Twins(?) in the 80's?

Matsui is suppose to have a deal by tonight. It's assumed that the only thing still needed is his signature. He gets $52 mil over 4 years. I think we're going to have to reconsider going for Giles if this happens...

with how slim this FA market is, i foresee the dodgers.... well doing exactly what they are doing now. sitting on their hands.

I will laugh in the McCourts' general direction if
1. They are expecting to have Colletti as the GM, Ng as the AGM, and Hershisher as the manager, but
2. Upon hiring Colletti, Ng quits.

I've noticed since doing this site that people get really impatient this time of year. Yes, the GM situation puts us behind - but you don't see any other teams doing any major signings yet. And given the free agent market, there will be a lot of teams doing exactly what the Dodgers appear to be doing now. Or, making scary signings - whichever you prefer.

re 144

that is true. i am guilty of that. but the uncertainty of everything in the front office is making me more unease as each day passes. Also, Mccourt has been really tight lip and well, very ambiguous and unclear on what the plan is for the 2006 dodgers, personal wise and payroll wise.

what are we looking at? are we cutting back on payroll and going with more internal, youner options? are we going to be players in free agency? are we going to be more aggresive in the trade market? i am just unclear of our direction and would like to know a little more. thats why im worried and impatient.

Last year, Kent signed December 9. Beltre and Drew signed their contracts later in the month.

I get that you're worried, but no matter who is hired, you're not going to know anything for a while. It's not as if having DePo in place 365 days ago helped us predict the Dodgers' actions on Kent/Beltre/Drew/Lowe/Perez/Valentin/Green/Navarro or any of our prospects.

146 Yes, but we signed our NRIs on Nov 14/16, if we don't do it soon, we could lose out! McCheap is at it again!

Some day before Nov 19th (I believe) will be interesting. I think that's the day we need our roster set for the Rule 5

141. Im not sure exactly how much Matsui will effect Giles. Sure, we know that Giles is better than matsui, but he is older. More importantly, there are many that think that Giles isnt much of a power hitter anymore, and while he's not the 40 homer threat he once was, Petco obviously has masked his SLG%. I read one article (i dont remember the author because I didnt bother to read the whole thing) where the author called Giles' previous contract a burden.

Because of his age, home ball park, and the lack of any RBI/clutch cult surrounding him, I think Giles should come at a relative bargain. But I think that St.Louis signs him, Im not sure why he would want to come to LA. SD looks pretty stupid right about now.

144-146,

Before the DePo firing, I was only checking the site once or twice a day because of work. But now I find myself checking and refreshing every minute I'm at a computer. I'm not worried about next season. I'm okay with only a few small signings. I'm worried about who becomes GM because I'm worried about the long term.

137 -- That seems pretty reasonable to me. After all, by the time we are adults we have to come to terms with the fact that our identification with the players is a form of fantasy, or else (as you say) we're just setting ourselves up for disappointment.

I was arguing that we need that fantasy element, but you're right to point out that we need to keep a perspective on the reality of the situation at the same time. It's a delicate balance. Since both are needed, I still think that it's not unreasonable to want to like the people you're rooting for, even if they may be more personas than persons.

#120, SiGeg, thanks. Far from putting words in my mouth, you stated what is my position better than I did. I do not shun statistical analysis when it comes to evaluating players but I certainly do not think it is the only way to construct a roster. If statistical anaylsis says that the Dodgers should trade for Bonds, sign Kenny Rogers, and give Kevin Brown a spot in the starting roatation, if I am GM, I am going to ignore statistical analysis, at least as far as those moves are concrned.

While I don't shun statistical analysis, I don't unreservedly embrace it either. There are plenty of ways to win in baseball. If baseball ever gets to the point where there is only one way to win, the sport will lose its appeal. A few years ago there were plenty of stat oriented people fitting Kenny Williams for a dunce cap. It would be good for baseball for Billy Beane to win a World Series to silence some of the nitwits on the other side who are equally as obnoxious.

I have said more than once here that Sandy Koufax is the best pitcher I have ever seen. Quite frankly I don't particularly care if that is an accurate statement according a statistical classification of some other person. The best hitter I have ever seen is Barry Bonds. Again, if someone disagrees with me about that, statistically or otherwise, that is ok. I am glad that Sandy Koufax was a Dodger and that Barry Bonds is not. That is not a sentence based on statistics, but there is no law that I am aware of that requires me to live my life by the numbers.

Sanchez, I completely disagree with you when you say that my perceptions of baseball players are based on what I get from the "closed-minded and dimwitted media." Have you heard Barry Bonds talk?

Stan from Tacoma

Interesting article about Logan White's theory on pitching. Nothing revolutionary, but it has some nice information

http://dodgers.scout.com/2/467298.html

148 Psssst. Keep it on the down low. Giles is a good hitter. Mum's the word.

I know there are a lot of smart people on this site, but as a reality check: Most of the GMs in the major leagues know something about their jobs. They are aware of the past accomplishments of most players they would be in a position to acquire.

What distinguishes them is how they forecast the future, what theories if any they apply to evaluating the future. But in a market characterized by scarcity, even those GMs who foresee that the final years of a Giles contract are likely to be a debacle will consider paying.

They didn't count the White Sox pitching staff's stats this year. It's a pilot program.

137,150,151-

I too blame the "closed-minded and dimwitted media." Before all this coverage, I can't see how people could have gotten in to this whole judging of players based on their personal lives. It seems like the media now covers every aspect of star players' life. Not just the one on the diamond.

Babe Ruthe is considered the greatest player that ever lived. According to what I have now read about him, he wasn't exactly a saint. Many of us know he and Joe Dimaggio didn't speak for whole seasons at a time. I mean, there are rumors that ruthe got with Dimaggio's wife.They still won championships together. I doesn't seem like fans were making a fuss about it back then.

If ESPN would have been covering the situation non-stop and reporting on it every five minutes (T.O.), The yanks might have felt pressure to trade one of them. That seems to be an effect of how powerful mass media has become.

yeah Giles outproduced the top 4 MVP candidates in the AL and the number 2 guy in the NL on the road. Numbers 1 and 3 NL MVPers were only 2 of 6 who produced better than Giles on the road. GM's not in SD must be salavating over this. Plus he seems like a really good guy and thats an added bonus.

Giles outproduced Carlos Delgado, David Ortiz, Alex Rodriguez, Vladimir Guerrero, Andruw Jones, and Manny Ramirez on the road.

refreshing:

"I think he deserved it. The voting was the right vote. He was the right choice," Jones said of Puljos. "He had the most solid season average wise, home-run wise and RBI wise."

155 DiMaggio was the scroll wheel on Ed Barrow's iPod.

but what about Defense wise, as A-rod would say.

#155, Ruth and Joe D were not teammates. I have not looked this up, but I recall Babe's last year was in 1935 with the Boston Braves. Joe D's first year was in 1936 if I remember correctly.

Stan from Tacoma

156 Giles hit 15 home runs. Nine on the road. While in a perfect world, I would love Giles, with the loss of Kent/Bradley the Dodgers need another credible home run threat. With the rumored small payroll, it's not worth blowing the wad on a guy who, while very good, doesn't fill a big enough hole.

160-

Oops, sorry. I ment lou Gehrig.

159 He was about equal there.

If Colletti is hired, don't expect many of those prospects to stay in the system. Sabean has never been interested in developing prospects. He thinks of them as a trading chips only. A week or two ago, I had my Gillick team. Here's my Colletti team:
1. Signs Bill Mueller before the arbitration deadline and forfeits our 2nd round draft pick.
2. Signs J.T. Snow/Travis Lee for 1 year, non tenders Hee Seop Choi
3. Trades Milton Bradley to Pittsburgh for Mark Redman
4. Trades Jonathan Broxton, Chuck Tiffany, and Yhency Brazoban to Texas for Kevin Mench and Doug Brocail
5. Possibly signs Royce Clayton for 1 year
6. Signs Jason Johnson for 2 years/$11 million

C Navarro
1B J.T. Snow/Travis Lee
2B Jeff Kent
SS Oscar Robles/Royce Clayton
3B Bill Mueller
LF Kevin Mench
CF J.D. Drew
RF Jose Cruz Jr

SP
Penny
Lowe
Perez
Redman
Johnson

Gotta love those good old veterans!

150. I think your right and agree that its a balance that people need to keep in mind.

151. No I havent heard Barry Bonds talk without it being edited or interpited by the media. Now Im not saying Bonds was neccesarily misquoted or taken out of context, but, on the same note, there are many people that only know about Paul Depodesta via Bill Plascke's mouthpeice, what do you think their view of Depo is? All Im saying is I dont really trust a few sound bites to gage the moral standard of somebody. I have many friends that have said stupid things from time to time, hell, Ive said many stupid things from time to time. Really, its impossible not to have perceptions based on what the media says, becuase its all around us. All Im saying is that I think people have to take what the media presents us with a grain of salt.

Baseball players have always been in the news. There were people who were outraged by Ben Chapman's treatment of Jackie Robinson in 1947. Babe Ruth got his share of a bad press at times. Same for Ted Williams in Boston. All of that was well before ESPN.

Stan from Tacoma

At least McCourt can claim he's not the only one being turned down. Dayton Moore, the perceived front runner to become the Red Sox GM, has pulled out.

There are plenty of ways to win in baseball. If baseball ever gets to the point where there is only one way to win, the sport will lose its appeal. A few years ago there were plenty of stat oriented people fitting Kenny Williams for a dunce cap. It would be good for baseball for Billy Beane to win a World Series to silence some of the nitwits on the other side who are equally as obnoxious.
Nice post. I think what we should all remember is to respect each others methodologies for evaluating players, even if it isn't based on logic, reasoning or statistical analysis. A couple of points though. I don't think stat/moneyball people ever said their way was the only way to win. I think they are just trying to give their team the best chance possible to win given the purse strings they have. Baseball games will always be decided on the field no matter if a sabermetrics approach or Tommy Lasorda approach is used. But I am of the belief that a sabermetrics approach can give your team a better chance of winning if done right. The game still has so much luck involved that anything can still happen. Just like in blackjack, if you play by the book you can maximize your chances of winning (up to a certain point), but if you hit a 16 when the dealer has a 6 showing you really aren't helping your cause. That's why it's nice to have stats on your side. You know to hold your 16 and hope the dealer busts. But you aren't going to be successful every time. vr, Xei

166- Of course. I just don't think that the attempt of Judgement of character of some players that happens today existed back then. Again, I don't think the country would be up in arms about this whole "T.O. wants a new contract" thing if it wasn't for ESPN's insane coverage. Not to mention their very opinionated analysts.

Milton Bradely, to me, seems to be another player that has been done in by mass media. If he would have played in the 20's would he have been seen in the same light? I wasn't around back then so I wouldn't know, but It seems that T.V. has a lot to do with it. I might be wrong.

167 This quote from Dayton Moore tops anything I've read from Colletti:

"My philosophy is you should have three or four kids a year competing with your 25-man roster every season. If you don't have that, I think you're going to run into trouble as an organization."

Christy Mathewson was considered the paragon of virtue in his day. Ty Cobb was a bad man, but in the children's literature of his day, he was portrayed as a great guy (a friend of mine has researched this and presented it at a SABR convention.)

Just who is good and who is bad is always an opinion. There are public personae and private personae. Very few people ever know both aspects of a sports figure.

164 -
So after Kent looks at your lineup, does he say "those good ol' veterans" or does he march into Colletti's office and demand to be traded? If the latter, what does Colletti get for him?

167 -
I think Moore has been promised the GM job in Atlanta in a year or two in order to keep him there. Scheurholz is probably about ready to step back a little or retire completely.

Dayton Moore, now there's someone I wish McCourt was smart enough to go after. I wouldn't expect him to, however.

Moore will be the GM of the braves in a year or two. JS is going to "step down" and become the team president or something and let moore take over as GM.

Moore would have been a great choice for the red sox or dodgers.

XFrank, I must say you lost me there. I don't know why I should respect anyone's opinion that is not based on logic, reason or statistical analysis.

Stan from Tacoma

Colletti spoke about how important it is to look at players' lives. OK, let's take a look at key components of recent Giants teams under Colletti:

Barry Bonds. Model citizen.
Jeff Kent. Self-professed jerk and truck-washer.
AJ Pierzynski. The Twins players openly hated him, yet the Giants took him anyway, then let him walk when the Giants players hated him, too.
Sidney Ponson. Is he in jail in Aruba now?

Who am I missing here? Can anyone else think of any other examples?

Also, doesn't McCourt directly contradict himself by firing a GM for one bad season (70ish wins) for "poor results" and hiring an AGM coming off a 70ish-win season (with fewer aggregate injuries)?

I can't wait for this paragraph in the newspaper:

"The Dodgers hired Giants Assistant GM Ned Colletti to replace Paul DePodesta, who was fired after a 71-win season. Colletti, who is coming off a 72-win season with the Giants, will begin making offseason plans in Los Angeles while Dodger owner Frank McCourt is at the MLB owners' meetings..."

175- The Christian Guzman contract didn't seem to be based on logic, reason, or statistical analysis. But if Jim Bowden were a DT poster, we should still respect his opinion that it was a good signing.

Sorry if I seem bitter, but if we hire Colletti, I'm going to lose it completely.

I think bitterness is completely understandable for Dodger fans. Considering the current circumstances.

176 -
As I recall Sabean is the GM in SF. We really have no idea how much Colletti agreed with any of his moves. Apparently his main job with the Giants has been to negotiate contracts. He may agree with every one of Sabean's moves, but we have no way of knowing that. Maybe his statement about looking at how people live their lives was another way of saying he disagrees with the Giants moves...................or maybe not. I'd still rather have Ng.

175. haha! I guess I mean respect in the sense that every person is entitled to his or her own opinion. Just like my neighbor who is a big sports fan. The other day I said, "Seems like those Dodgers are sure in disarray after firing Tracy and Depodesta!" He told me, "Yeah, but I really like what Jim Tracy did." I had to bite my tongue and respectfully entitle him to his opinion which didn't seem based on logic, reasoning or good statistical analysis. vr, Xei

Is it just me or is "negotiating contracts" a much less critical skill for a GM than choosing players with whom to negotiate contracts? If Colletti is sitting across the table from Jacque Jones' agent, all of his perceived leadership skill and negotiating experience won't go a long way toward fixing our LF situation.

182
It is not just you.

164 That seems a bit alarmist.

Did the Giants ever have a corps of potential stars lined up in the minors like the Dodgers do? Likely not.

Plus the presence of Bonds on the roster determined the Giants' personnel strategy. They could never rebuild so long as Bonds was on the roster--and still can't. They have had to build around him. Given they didn't have infinite payroll to go after FA's, they had to use their prospects in trades to pick up the other pieces they needed. When Bonds retires, the Giants are due for a big fall--but I don't think it's going to come as any surprise to them.

They also had to pursue a strategy to keep the fannies in the seats to cover bond payments on Pac Bell, uh SBC, uh AT&T Park. Giant fans are fair-weather fans. I remember in college sitting in Candlestick with 11,000 people, even when they had Vida Blue, Willie McCovey and Jack Clark.

Given those strategic imperatives, you'd have to judge Sabean and Colletti as having been successful.

The Dodgers are in a completely different situation. We don't have a superstar on our roster to whom we've committed a quarter of our payroll. We are obviously under pressure to win, but the pressure isn't financial in the same way. And we are rich in prospects--maybe richer than any team in the game. The strategy Colletti would pursue will reflect the Dodgers' realities, not the Giants'. It's not likely to be too much different from the strategy DePodesta pursued.

Situations determine strategy far more than individuals, generally speaking.

Trustworthy poster on ESPN board reporting that Colletti is the new GM, though no link yet.

168. sabermetrics, or the so-called moneyball approach isnt a method or model for building a team. It just a willingness to apply logic and reason to baseball analysis, in particular to challenge longheld assumptions. I think of it akin to the scientific revolution, which didnt tell people how to discover truth, but advocated the use of reason and logic instead of opinion, tradition, and faith.

I believe there is a place in this world for irrational paths to truth, unfortuantly I dont think that baseball is one of those. If scientific analysis can send men to the moon, it can sure as hell answer the questions of baseball.

177. we can respect his opinion, but question his judgement

182 What's worse, if we hire Colletti, we'd have 2 contract GMs, and no player talent ones. I wouldn't be surprised if Ng, whose speciality is also contract negotiations, steps down to go to Boston or somewhere if Colletti is hired.

Of course, Colletti could be great at identifying talent for all we know

185 Guess who announced it? Vic the Bric. I'm not willing to trust him

Supposedly someone else has announced it, with a 9 am press conference tomorrow. Hopefully Colletti isn't as bad as we think

what happens to Ng, smith and white!??!

i am concerned. mccourt tries to restore dodger tradition by hiring a Giant.....

186
I quote from a work by Herbert Simon:

"We ask, "If we can go to the Moon, why can't we …?" Going to the moon was a complex matter along only one dimension: it challenged our technological capabilities. It was achieved in an exceedingly cooperative environment, employing a single organization, NASA, that was charged with a single, highly operational goal. With enormous resources provided to it, and operating through well-developed market mechanisms, that organization could draw on the production capabilities and technological sophistication of our whole society. Although several potential side effects of the activity played a major role in motivating the project, they did not have to enter much into the thoughts of the planners once the goal of placing men on the Moon had been set."

Now ESPN radio is saying it supposedly. Well, too bad for Ng

188,190
See 143

Bob, I agree that making judgments about sports people (or anyone for that matter) is a dicey proposition. Very few people are unadultratedly good or bad. I am trying to think of Cobb's virtues but am quite frankly drawing a blank. Ruth certainly was capable of crude behavior yet he could be very kind too. Same goes for Ted Williams.

The notion though that somehow the media is at fault for the behavior of athletes seems to me off the mark. There are plenty of players who are not Kenny Rogers, Terrell Owens, and Barry Bonds. I suppose a case could be made that the media creates an environment that glorifies bad behavior, though I don't think it is a convincing case. Baseball players in the 19th century were hardly paragons of virtue, and television or radio were not on the scene, nor did the yellow press get its reputation from its sports coverage.

Stan from Tacoma

ESPN News just reported it.

Ned Colleti... hmmm...

Colletti link:

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2225383

http://tinyurl.com/beuq8

Dodgers hire Colletti for general manager post

ESPN- 5:36PM PST

190 At this point, clearing house for Colletti and McCourt wouldn't be wise. I think White is safe, and Ng's future is probably her own decision (Boston?). Smith could be gone, i really know very little about him. If Colletti is wise, he'll keep Collins, White, and Ng, who are all very familiar with the farm

189 Henson's scenario--both the outcome and timing--seems to be holding. Wednesday morning and Colletti. Today was probably about dealing with Ng's reaction to being passed over.

Jamie:"...General Manager Kim Ng, Baseball Commissioner Kim Ng...there just wasn't enough time..."

Kim: "We'll get there, pop."

Whew, that saved me a few drinks. Sorry for Kim Ng but now lets get down to business. Give the man a chance before you bury him.

Off to the Clippers taking the new orange line. I expect the posts to be about at 400 by the time I get back.

186-

When Copernicus theorized that the Sun is in the center of the Universe and not Earth, He was widely criticized even though his arguement was completely logical and eliminated anomalies that existed in the earlier accepted system.

Copernicus' theory challenged Peoples' view of the universe. Something they wholeheartedly beleived was true. Something that had been tought and accepted by generations. People have a hard time accepting new theories that forces them to change their outlook of life. Sabermetrics challenges fans to change their whole outlook on baseball. I think that is a large part of why many fans have a hard time accepting it, even if it seems completely logical.

So who's the new manager? Hershiser or Wotus? If Ng leaves, I'd expect Hershiser to become the AGM, with Wotus as manager. I'm still hoping Ng won't leave, but I wouldn't be surprised

The stupidity of it all is breathtaking. Just another conformist baseball suit getting in line to sign the Neifis of the world. Ludicrous.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Well, it's likely that there's a lot about Collett and Ng that we don't know, and that makes Colletti the better choice.

But from what we DO know, I doubt it, and I'm disappointed. He's guilty until proven innocent, as far as I'm concerned, but I'm hoping to be wrong.

My biggest fear about Colletti is that he bought into Sabean's veterans movement, and will guy the farm for mediocre (or worse) "proven veterans."

I understand Ratt's (optimistic) point about strategies adapting to situations, but that assumes a person who is willing to adapt. Look at Jim Tracy this year - managing as though he still had the 2003 team. Lots of people have a hammer and think everything is a nail.

So McCourt tells Depo to take 2mil and take a hike only to turn around and hire the Giants AGM over his own AGM, this is pretty much Major League part 3.

200 I'm fully willing to do that. Most people here are basing their opinion of Colletti off one interview, for all we know, he was just preaching Sabean's policy and doesn't necessarily agree with it.

I'm more worried about 2 contract experts as the GM/AGM tandem. I really don't see Ng sticking around.

And for the record, with Bonds soon to be gone, the Giants are no longer following their sign a player immediately to lose the picks policy. That just seems to be a strategy used for one period of time, rather than strategy set in stone.

204 FNC.com?

I am not a happy camper. To all those who advise that we wait to judge the McCourts and give them a chance to fix their mistakes, I say I would if they would stop making even bigger and bigger mistakes.

Am I any less of a Dodger fan for having Angel envy?

Would it be fair to say that signing Colletti was NOT a move made by the McCourts with public image, reputation, opinion, etc. in mind?

211 "Am I any less of a Dodger fan for having Angel envy? "

At this point I envy the Devil Rays.

The only positive about Colletti is he comes from an organization that has long valued talent over the 'intangibles'. The Giants have lived with Barry Bonds for all these years. Even signing guys like AJ, Ponson, etc...

But to pass over Kim Ng for this guy is a joke.

I hope Kim Ng quits.

McCourts truely are clueless. If they were going to fire DePo, they should have knew Theo was in the bag. Apparently, not even ownership could convince him to take the job.

This is a dark night to be a Dodger fan.

I think I'll be following more A's games next year.

I envy the Dbacks, but just a little.

212. Yes. From a PR standpoint, its a horrible move. From a financial standpoint, equally horrible. And then from a baseball standpoint, well we dont know that yet. But if the present state of the Giants is any evidence, this is not a good move.

206 Tracy was an obvious idiot. Certainly McCourt is worse than an idiot.

I'm just not willing to put Colletti in the same category yet. He's the least sexy of the three possible candidates--granted. But you can't back up a judgement that he is not good at what he does, judged by results. The Giants made a huge bet on Bonds, and I think most would agree, it has paid off for them as good as they could have realistically hoped. Colletti was part of that.

Look at it this way. If the Dodgers could get Albert Pujols this week, for $18 million a season for a seven year deal, what would you suggest they do? For those who say yes, that's more than just a decision to play Albert Pujols at first base. It's a decision that affects every other decision.

The Rockies get blasted because they put all this money into Todd Helton, but couldn't build a contending team around him, leaving them with the worst of both worlds (so far). Colletti/Sabean successfully leveraged their bet on a pricey superstar, where O'Dowd failed.

Sounds like "Moneyball" to me!

Where is Jon? I need a voice of reason to help me deal psychologicly with the Dodgers.

Bonds 40
Grissom 38
Alou 38
Vizquel 38
Snow 37
Matheny 34
Tucker 34
Durham 33

No, that's not doubles. 15th in Runs/Game.

218
Always expect the worst. You will never be disappointed. That works for me.

So what will Plaschke think? Former Giant, I don't see him embracing McCourt. Then what will McCourt do?

Hope Jon won't mind...

Dodgers hire former Giants aide Colletti as GM
/ Associated Press
Posted: 4 minutes ago

LOS ANGELES (AP) - The Los Angeles Dodgers hired Ned Colletti as their general manager on Tuesday to replace the fired Paul DePodesta.

Colletti has been an assistant GM with the rival San Francisco Giants since 1997. He beat out Dodgers assistant GM Kim Ng, who was trying to become the first woman in major league history to be hired as a GM.
Ng and Colletti were thought to be the only candidates to interview for the job. Former Texas Rangers and Cleveland Indians GM John Hart withdrew as a candidate on Monday.

Dodgers spokeswoman Camille Johnston confirmed the hiring of Colletti, who has served under Giants general manager Brian Sabean for the past nine years.

The 50-year-old Colletti is considered a good negotiator and a good communicator, attributes owner Frank McCourt said he wanted in a GM after he fired DePodesta on Oct. 29.

DePodesta was let go after less than two years on the job. He succeeded Dan Evans and signed a five-year contract in February 2004, shortly after McCourt purchased the team from News Corp.

The Dodgers are also without a manager. McCourt said at the time of DePodesta's firing that the search to replace Jim Tracy would be on hold until a GM is hired.

The team had a 71-91 record last season — its worst since 1992 and second-poorest since the franchise moved from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1958. The Dodgers won the NL West championship in 2004 with a 93-69 record.

#@$%#@$^@@@$&

my stomach just turned over. colletti sounds pretty bad. i'm fearful for the future.

222
Regarding McCourt's alleged desire for a "good negotiator," I wonder if McCourt was not happy with the contracts that Depo signed. He may have felt that a more skilled negotiator could have gotten better terms on some of the bigger contracts Depo engineered (e.g. Drew, Lowe, etc.).

If the Harvard guy got fired for being no good, what chance does the guy from Northern Illinois have?

The first move by an empty suit, baseball lemming GM...hire a manager.

God help us all.

217 I'm not pre-judging Colletti. He may turn out OK, there is even a chance he could be great. But there is a high likelihood he will be mediocre to poor. Odds are that Depo would be a better choice going forward.

The people I am judging are the McCourts. Firing Depo for days of limbo only to hire Colletti was not a very smart thing to do.

this obviously increases the chances of us going hard after brian giles

giles at age 35, fits perfectly in the age criteria of colletti's free agent acquisitions with the giants.

The current state of the Giants is enough to not have warranted even a Ned Colletti interview.

The current Giants are like a run down old house.

And now the Dodgers are hiring one of the architects that built that house.

Just utterly ridiculous.

I guess Tommy Lasorda can say, "hey we have another old italian baseball man to carry on the dodger way..."

Yuck.

Predict Colletti's big free agent signing:
A) Jacque Jones
B) Joe Randa
C) J.T. Snow
D) Royce Clayton
E) Bill Mueller

E is the only acceptable option on this list. I'm going to go with C. Good bye Hee Seop and Milton.

i really think frank mccourt has a lot in common with george costanza: every decision he's made is wrong. Pretty much everything he's touched since buying the Dodgers has turned out badly.

[228] giles doesn't have enough RBIs though. doesn't our offense need another "proven run producer"? watch us trade the farm for manny.

Colletti has a test coming up. He must pass it for me to accept him. I want to see Edwards, Grabowski, and Myrow DFA'd by the 19th. I assume White and Collins will be responsible for protecting prospects

A side note:

Mets decline options on Ishii.

Ishii will receive $2.2 million, of which the Dodgers will pay $2M as part of the terms of the trade, instead of $3.25M if the Mets had re-signed him.

228- Giles is still productive, therefore he would be expensive. The Giants like them old and in the twilight of their career.

Well remember Colletti doesn't care for park effects. Preston Wilson anyone?

Giles had a .360 batting average with runners in scoring position. Maybe there is hope. Any chance that Tony "100 RBIs" Batista would come back to the U.S.? I know he signed a 2 year contract with a Japanese team. Ned might be interested.

if mccourt cares so much about PR, who is happy with this decision? I cant think of any contingent that would be happy about this. What must Jamie McCourt be thinking right now? Hopefully Frank is sleeping on the couch for this one.

Well, at least it wasn't Bowden.

dodgers.com now has a story. it's official. sigh.

Many DT posts have already expressed it: Colletti comes from an organization that has used aging talent to achieve whatever success it has had in the last decade. He's exactly the wrong guy for an organization whose biggest asset is its rich farm system.

Given a 50/50 chance (Ng vs. Colletti) of making a good decision, Frank McCourt once again shows that he has a 100% probability of screwing things up.

I'm a 35-year Dodger fan but enough is enough.

#$%^&* the Dodgers until Frank McCourt sells them.

238 I thought Jamie wanted Ng. I think this one is all Frank's fault.

at least we can be pretty sure orel is the new manager.

202

So in a sabermetric universe the batter hits the ball and runs around a path which does not have the pitcher at the center?

217 Don't get me wrong. If you've read anything I've posted in the past couple weeks, you know I think the firing of DePodesta was an unbelievably bad decision, made for the worst reasons imaginable.

I like Colletti less than I would've liked Epstein, Beinfest or Ng. But I like him better than the rest of the candidates like that got mentioned. And I don't think he's going to trade Billingsley for Marquis Grissom or sign J.T. Snow. McCourt wouldn't have hired a candidate who didn't drool appropriately over our prospects.

Young, cheap talent--it's part of that special "McCourt" brand of excellence, doncha know!

242. thats why he's sleeping on the couch

230. A. Jacque Jones will be to the Dodgers what Marquis Grissom was to the Giants.

Yep, I agree I could see JT Snow coming on board as well. We need another old guy, all field, no hit 1st basemen. The Angels have their Erstad. Now we'll have Snow.

Maybe we'll even trade Guzman to the M's to get Beltre back. After all, the Colletti must have loved Pedro Feliz. Since the Dodgers dont have any Feliz type of players, we'll have to trade for one.

Honestly, I cant think of a worse scenario than this one. Epstein, NG, Gillick, Hart, Moore, and then Colletti, Bowden's.. etc.

Steve may as well get firenedcolletti ready to go.

246 He should be banished to the dog house.

McCourt is making the dodgers seem like a chicken with its head cut off.

I am disturbed by one thing. Imagine Kevin Malone + pasta, and you've got Colletti's face.

Colletti Press Conference tomorrow at 9am? Dodger PR staff must be hoping that Simers and Plaschke get out of bed late.

Sounds like I need to drop by the Effigy District on my way home and pick up some McCourts and see if they have the new Colletti model. Then I can resell them to DT posters and make out like bandits.

Effigy-making is America's fastest growing business!

At 9 am, most people will be wrapped up in the Bahrain-Trinidad & Tobago World Cup qualifier.

I dont think we can make many generalizations about Colletti yet, we cant automatically blame him for all the dumb Giant moves, Sabean and Baker, among other deserve responsibility. They have also made some very shrewd moves as well.

Really, this isnt about Colletti, its about Frank McCourt. This decision doesnt make any sense, and we are so far beyond the point of trusting McCourt's decision making skills its not even funny. Its possible that Colletti may be ok, or even good for the Dodgers. But this decision has zero rationale. I seriously doubt that McCourt will provide any usefull answers tommorow. A firefrankmccourt.com has been needed for a long time.

247- Beltre is too young and makes too much money. Joe Randa is a good defender, a good clutch hitter, and is a leader in the clubhouse. Jacque Jones is Colletti's dream player. He's very young (31 in April!), a pretty good defender, very athletic, a clutch hitter, and a good bunter.

251. I thought the exact same thing when i saw his picture. Maybe Kevin Malone changed his name and gained some weight, and this is all part of his master plan to take his revenge on the Dodgers for firing him.

254-- To be fair, people should at least wait until after Colletti's first Press Conference before the bonfires get stoked, and the effigy strung up.

Dodgers fans can start to fretti
'Cause they've hired Ned Colletti.
Though McCourt is still in debtti
Will he trade for "proven vetti?"
Some of us are quite upsetti--
Surely, we've seen nothing yetti.

so far the Giant blogosphere has hardly reacted at all to this defection. Interestingly, the ones I looked at all had big posts about the new, tough steroids policy. Guess steroids would be a top of mind issue up there...

funny, i just glanced and humbugardy and was thinking about anti-mccourt poetry.

*at humbugardy.

ken's edit feature can't come quickly enough :)

Sticking with the Dodgers since '47, I'm not leaving now, as much as this doofus of an owner gives us all a lot of reason to. Does this mean that Tommy LaPasta has more influence over McCourt than his wife, given the Italian connection?
Someone at the press conference tomorrow should try to get some sense of what the budget range will be (remember DePo's talk about "dry powder"? What happened to it; there hasn't been much rain. Until we have an idea of what the budget will be, a lot of this speculation about off-season moves is really dancing in the dark.

253 How do I order one?

Crap. I was hoping for Ng or some sort of miracle.

It seems to me people are making claims for sabermetrics that can't possibly hold up. Sabermetrics did not get anyone to the moon. It is not a unified theory of baseball.

On a Mariner blog the other day Dave Cameron said that stat people in general had not given proper consideration to the importance of defense. Ok. I gather there are plenty of people trying to reduce his observation to a number.

There is something called the statisticians' fallacy: That which counts best counts most. I don't bring that up to say that people should not count. A person who refuses to count will not succeed in baseball or much else for that matter. But it is folly to confuse statistics with wisdom. It seems to me that comparing sabermetrics with space exploration or the Copernican revolution is creating a false mythology about sabermetrics that statistically oriented people should be the first to avoid.

Stan from Tacoma

I am sad.

So who's the first Sun or 51 to get Nathaned?

billingsley and broxton for darin erstad!!!

266 - "But it is folly to confuse statistics with wisdom."

I'm not sure what you mean by that, but I'll take a stab at responding to it. Assuming you're saying that stats don't take into direct account an exact quantification of someone's baseball knowledge you're absolutely right. But lets say you measure a statistic, say, homeruns, and a player you're eyeing has 40. Whether its a combination of talent, wisdom, luck, or whatever, he hit 40 homeruns. Thats the bottom line. He may be of average talent and great baseball wisdom, or he may be a total idiot who's batspeed and eye are unmatched, either way, he hit 40 homeruns. So while it might be nice to be able to quantify someone's baseball knowledge and their ability to apply it in a game to be able to predict future performance, you cant, and it isn't anyone's fault that you cant. (yet....)

269- only if he can't get J.T. Snow. Or maybe they can get both and put Erstad in LF (in CF he'd get injured-they need to keep his bat in the lineup).

nobody's confusing statistics with wisdom. statistics provide insight, and they're important. they're not the only thing, but they're important.

270 (yet as in not being able to quantify wisdom, not in that it will be someone's fault in the future)

269. Our darin erstad will be played by JT Snow.

Wouldnt it be hilarious if we ended up giving up a draft pick to pick up JT Snow?

Sabean/Colletti were known for such moves, one year forfeiting a 1st round pick to sign Mike Tucker.

Glory days are back again.

We just made a giant mistake.

Pun intended. As if we don't have enough to groan about right now.

Oh well, McCourt will probably fire him after next season anyway.

I wonder if Cruz Jr. will get released...

Does anyone know if Coletti was with the Giants when Orel played there (yeah, thats a hard one to type). Perhaps Orel gave the Dodgers a heads up on what he thought was a good GM candidate. Hypothetical Orel has potentially screwed the Dodgers.

275 - Oh well, McCourt will probably fire him after next season anyway.

That's the only thing keeping me going.

274- the draft pick will probably be for Jacque Jones or Joe Randa

I don't know Ned Colletti but I imagine he would ask McCourt what he wants to do with the club before he trades the farm. I doubt McCourt even has a clue. Colletti is not the bad guy; that title belongs to McCourt. If Colletti does not get the Dodgers to the post season in 06 and he gets a bad press (two things which I believe are linked), it is very likely that Colletti won't be around very long.

Stan from Tacoma

the good news is that we cant give away our first round pick this year because its in the top 15.

so thats good news!

275 "Oh well, McCourt will probably fire him after next season anyway."

I doubt it. As long as the players don't go on another freak injury binge, the club has to improve over last year. Add the fact that if Colletti stays true to his Giant roots, he will trade away prospects that will help next year at the cost of the future.

So 2006 will see an improvement and Colletti will stay on board long enough to really run the club into the ground.

I have a feeling that Colletti's opening press conference will be a better received than anything DePodesta gave.

Are there any mean people in the world named Ned? Think about it?

Ned Flanders. Ned Ryerson.

I could go on.

Bob, did Ned Garver ever throw a brushback pitch?

I have heard Colletti on post game radio shows on KNBR. He sounds reasonable to me. I said the same thing about DePo when I heard him interviewed. I have not heard Jim Bowden interviewed but he does not sound reasonable to me. I don't think that is the result of media distortions that were being discussed about a 100 or so posts ago either.

Stan from Tacoma

Colletti's PR and Sportswriting background must have helped him.

Actually Bowden would have been a good fit with McCourt. They are both impulsive and seem to like firing people.

Stan from Tacoma

So this is the much vaunted return to the "Dodger Way" - hiring someone from the Giants?

282. Ned Kelly.

286

This is the biggest front office poaching by the Dodgers from the Giants since they hired Wilbert Robinson as manager.

the dodgers have hired colletti
they're probably expecting confetti
but i think kim ng
would've brought us a ring
and that ned's brain is made of spaghetti

288. Are the Dodgers in for an Uncle Robbie type run?

Kim Ng doesn't rhyme with ring. It rhymes with gong or long.

darn, are you sure? i saw multiple interpretations of it and just ran with the most convenient one. ah well, back to the drawing board.

Parking lot attendants from Nantucket,
Bought a baseball team so they could it.
They've done well so far,
And they've lowered the bar,
And the team will sure soon kick the bucket.

293
There should be four asterisks between "could" and "it", but they disappeared.

Ned Beatty.

"Waking" Ned Devine.

Ned Beatty is a bad person?

It's hard to judge the Ned Devine character since he was dead.

Isn't there a Ned on South Park? The guy who talks with one of those throat vibrator things?

289 LMAO Vishal! That was great!

Now Frank McCourt hired a Giant
And it's making us feel quite defiant
You'd think he would know
He can't hire a foe
If he wants us to be more compliant

Yes, I am an artiste. LOL

But what is Ned Colletti's real first name?

Edward
Theodore
Ned

299. Nedrick?

293 Woooo Hoooo! Another limerick! Nice job
D4P, that was funny.

And I think we all got the gist of what you were trying to say, missing asterisks or not. Hehehehehe.

291. Bob Timmermann
Kim Ng doesn't rhyme with ring. It rhymes with gong or long.

How about long gong. As the Dodger tradition. (it's gone)

299
Even trickier question. What letter does J.D. Drew's first name start with?

J
D
Z

the dodgers' dumb owners from boston
must be blind in this fog they are lost in
colletti or ng?
the dodgers chose wrong
in the future it could end up costin'

Hope Colletti has better luck than poor Ned Beatty in "Deliverence".

So much for "The Dodger Way" if Marichal can play in Dodger Blue (not to mention Kent, Ledee and Cruz Jr), and Hershiser in orange and black.

305-- Make that "Deliverance."

If the Dodgers hire Wotus, too, I think I'll just spend the summer watching women's volleyball on TV.

I've been a Dodger fan for 51 years so I think I have as much at stake here as anyone. I would have rather seen Theo than Ng. I would have rather seen Ng than Colletti, but jeez, give the guy a chance.

As I mentioned earlier today, Sabean is the one calling the shots in SF, not Colletti. If you insist on placing some of the blame on Colletti then you also have to give him credit for 3 divisional championships and 1 league championship since 1997. How does the Dodgers track record stack up against that?

Colletti may turn out to be the worst hire in sports history, but at least let him make his first stupid deal before coming down on him.

I think a lot of you are worried that he will succeed and you're afraid that by extension that means sabremetrics doesn't work. It would mean no such thing, only that other approaches can work as well.

Give the new guy a chance. He hasn't yet traded the entire farm system for the Giants batboy. When he does, then start your yelling. Maybe he'll surprise all of us.

283

re: Bowden...

I'm not so sure about Bowden being as evil as we all may have thought. He did fleece the Padres and stocked some good players in the Reds farm. His crappy moves upon becoming interm GM could've been something of a PR move Selig and co., put him up to for publicity. Anyhow, I heard him on some talk show and he dropped VORP and Range Factor and a few other sabermetric Key Terms--
He still may be a schmuck, but I'm more scarred of Coletti.

Poor Frank McCourt hasn't a clue
`Bout what he should say or should do
So to him I say
No geeks from the bay
Should wind up wearing true Dodger blue

Our former GM known as Depo,
Was visited by the Grim Repo.
His career was killed
And his stead has been filled
All because Frank McCourt is a cheapo.

I didn't object to Bowden's personnel moves, but more to his personality which is incredibly egotistical. Bowden would have made Kevin Malone look like a shrinking violet.

312...

Indeed

308. I'm most concerned about Colletti for the following reasons:

#1. The contracts of Ed Alfonso, Mike Matheny, Omar Vizquel. Giving up a draft pick to sign Mike Tucker

#2. Steroids are now illegal

#3. Colletti's interview with BP that mentioned that 'approach to the game', was more valued than the underlying stat line.

#4. If Colletti's expertise is in contracts, how do you give him an endorsement considering the backloaded deals to players over 35?

I'm all for giving him a chance. But if I was the hiring manager and saw his resume, I'd immediately would have tossed it into a waste paper basket.

I heard on a couple of radio shows tonight that Orel would be named manager, but I'm not sure if that was conjecture or based on some sort of knowledge.

Anyone out there heard anything with regard to the manager's spot?

308-- Best post of the night.

Remember after DePo got the GM job all the posters who were convinced that Gagne was a goner because a "moneyball" doesn't value closers? Or that Ng and White would leave in deference to their deposed boss Evans?

A smart GM will work with his (her)strengths, and adapt to the situation.

We just have to find out if Colletti is going to be allowed to be a smart GM. . .

[315] i'd bet money on orel being the new manager.

I heard Orel as well, it was just a matter of naming a GM first. Of course, if that's false, then I'd guess Wotus has a legitimate chance

314 -

I'm concerned as well. I'm just saying that since Frankie Baby isn't going to take a survey on DT as to whether he should call off tomorrow's press conference, we might as well at least let Colletti make his first stupid move before crucifying him. Who knows, he might make three good moves before the first bad one.

308 Considering all the different strategies that have paid off with world series wins lately, it almost seems as if it is a crapshoot regarding what strategy will win in any given year. Personally, as long as a good number of our young players in the minors come up and play well for the Dodgers in the next 2-4 years, I'll be happy.

[319]

nobody has crucified him yet (well, okay, i did make a crack about his brains being made of spaghetti, but that was just for the sake of the rhyme, i swear! hehe).

i think people are mainly just disappointed and fearful. of course it remains to be seen what colletti will ACTUALLY be like. and then we'll really crucify him if necessary. or praise him. but for now i don't see anything wrong with being frustrated or disappointed at the pick.

316 -

Thanks gvette. If it turns out he's doing ridiculous things I'll be out there yelling with everyone else.

By the way, I'm convinced that what really got him the job are his people skills (I know that makes most of you even more angry).
McCourt wants someone who is upbeat and optimistic. I think that Ng was just a little too reserved for him and may have reminded him a little of what he didn't like in DePo. Colletti came in and bowled him over with personality and that, my friends, is the best way to gain employment at Dodger Stadium with the current ownership in place.

Maybe he'll be like Ned Beatty in "Network." He'll sit McCourt down and tell him, "YOU have meddled with the primal forces of nature. And YOU WILL ATONE!"

Colletti's hiring might turn out to be good news for Milton. If he's looking for guys who play with passion, he might consider MB a project. Of course, McCourt could have included a proviso in Colletti's contract stating that he has to make his first transaction the trading of Bradley.

Agree with 308. I would have prefered NG but really what difference does it make? Frank is still calling the shots and he is the idiot we have to be wary of. I also think (and hope) Frank's inherent cheapness will turn out to be a benifit in that he would rather pay some kids $300 per than some over the hill superstar millions.

As for the Giants, I for one find it difficult to argue with their success. Five trips to the playoffs, including a WS if Dusty isn't an idiot. As for the rest of the Giants and thier old man contracts none of use know what McGowen ordered his GM and AGM to do. Second, when you have a superstar like Barry, the usual rules don't apply. Its only partly about winning. The rest is about maximizing revenue while he is still worth watching and drawing fans. Finally, maybe some of the contracts were Sabean's doing and Colletti opposed them.

In any event, I will give Colletti a chance.

One more thing, although I hate McCourt and it pains me to say this, I have to give him credit for one thing: Even though he choose wrong, he had the nuts to go with who he believed was the best choice. For once, he was not seduced by the cheap and easy PR Ng would have brought him. Maybe instead of being cheap, clueless and a PR whore, he is only cheap and clueless.

I know I should not rush to judgement and we do not know his plans for the future, but really I am depressed. Just got back from class, watching UCLA game and then I see scrolling across the bottom line that the Dodgers hire Ned Colletti. This is my worst nightmare. All I want is for us to keep majority of our minor leaguers. I do not even care about 2006, please just keep the minor leaguers. I am going to go insane if all these guys are off being all-stars on other teams.