So ... that was an odd week.
If I were to tell you at the beginning of the week that the Dodgers would go 3-3 in three games sets versus the Cardinals and Angels, would you guess a sweep of the Cardinals and then a sweep by the Angels? Would you?! I think not. The results this week were not necessarily odd, just unexpected.
No, no. The odd this week seemed to come more from off the field than on it.
Draft Dodgers (SEE WHAT I DID THERE?!)
The annual amateur draft was held this week, and the Dodgers made a couple picks that might be considered odd.
First, they drafted an 18 year old pitcher who almost everyone feels is "unsignable." You can read my thoughts here ... as if you didn't already.
But, here's just a couple other things I noticed.
Logan White seems to have something against the coaches at LSU because he's trying to steal all their players.
First he drafts Zach Lee in the 1st round, who has a strong commitment to LSU.
Later, in the sixth round, White drafted Kevin Gausman, another high schooler with who seems committed to LSU.
But White didn't stop there. Before he drafted Gausman, he drafted LSU's center fielder Leon Landry in the 3rd round, and after, in the 8th round, he drafted LSU's 1st baseman Blake Dean.
In an ideal world, the Dodgers would take both of LSU's top pitching recruits, their center fielder, and their first baseman.
Lucky for LSU, the Dodgers will probably sign neither Lee nor Gausman, so at least their rotation will be ok next year.
The second thing I noticed was the Dodgers drafted (and signed) someone who already has my support because of his facial hair.
"What?" you ask. I'll tell you.
In the 28th round, the Dodgers drafted Mike Drowne out of Sacred Heart University. Now, I like to look up a little bit of info on the players the Dodgers draft so I went to Sacred Heart U's website and navigated my way to the athletics page and then to Drowne's page, where I found this amazing profile pic.
They look like vertical parenthesis for his mouth!
Immediately, I was intrigued. I mean, it's fantastic! He looks like a villain from the 1800s. A train magnate who wants to demolish a small town to build his railroad empire ... and yes, he's wearing a tophat in this scenario.
However ... I was disappointed when I visited the website a few days later to see an article talking about Drowne being drafted. Accompanying said story was this picture of Drowne.
Suddenly, heart-breakingly mustache-less.
Admittedly, this soured me on Drowne just a bit.
I later realized, though, it does take a certain kind of bravado (or stupidity) to take a profile picture of yourself with a crazy set of fake facial hair and allow it to go up on a website that's going to be visited by a good amount of people.
So, Mike Drowne, if you are reading this, and I'm sure you are, I'm not mad at you for the fake facial hair, and I'm telling you this: if you grow back that facial hair and keep it through your trip in the minors, and you have my full support.
The McCourts Did Something Crazy, Though Really, Not Totally Surprising
Ok, seriously, at this point, is there anyone left in the McCourt camp?
I mean, is there any Dodger fan who's been following the events of the past year or so who still fully supports either of the McCourts as owner of this team?
If so, this one is for you...
The McCourts hired and paid a six figure salary to an old Russian to send positive vibes, or "V Energy" to the Dodgers.
This has already been sufficiently discussed/made fun of on various blogs (like MSTI, MoKM, and SoSG) so I'll just add one thing, the thing that makes me most sad about all this.
Yes, this whole thing is impossibly stupid/incredibly insane/a tremendous waste of money ... pick your choice.
The real sad thing about all this is this question: were you really shocked? To be honest, I wasn't.
Sure, I was surprised. It's hard to see something like this coming. But at this point, did anyone read this article and react with disbelief. "Noooo ... the McCourts couldn't have done something so irrational ... they wouldn't have paid all this money to some crazy Russian guy who knows nothing about baseball! Impossible!"
I think, at least for Dodgers fans, the McCourts have entered the Tyson Zone. For those who don't know, the Tyson Zone (described here) was created by Bill Simmons as a way to describe an athlete (or in this case, team owner) whose behavior is so odd that any story you ready about them, no matter how bizarre, is believable.
For example, if you were to read tomorrow that the McCourts spent a million dollars two seasons ago to uproot the grass in the outfield and replant it with special Australian fertilizer that would bring good fortunes to the team, would you blink an eye? Oh, and by the way, to pay off the dirt, parking is being raised to $25 a car.
Or, say you read tomorrow that the McCourts were fighting for custody of Reed Johnson. Would you faint from surprise?
It's really unfortunate that it has come to this. The Dodgers are one of the most historic franchises in baseball, and right now the McCourts are making them a laughing stock. I mean, how many pre-season predictions did you read this Spring Training that had the Dodgers not finishing in first in the NL West because of distractions with ownership?
Luckily, at least so far, the Dodgers have been able to avoid front office issues. I mean, hey, they were in first place at one point this week before finishing the week a game behind the Padres.
But that's not to say the Dodgers haven't been affected. Just this week, the Dodgers most likely forfeited a first round pick on a player that was always going to be too expensive to sign. And this comes after they forfeited two other early picks when they didn't offer arbitration to Randy Wolf and Orlando Hudson this offseason.
... What do you believe an owner's role should be with a team? I see it as this: First, the Owner should pony up the money. The Owner should never be afraid to put money into their team. If they don't want to spend, then they shouldn't be an Owner. Two, the Owner shouldn't embarrass the team. That doesn't mean they necessarily need to be the face of the team (see Arte Moreno), but if you aren't going to put on a good front, then just disappear into your Owner's box. Be a silent owner. Show up to hold up the Championship Trophy and then go away. The last thing you should be doing is filling newspaper headlines with your divorce hearings or doing things like hiring Rasputin for a six figure sum to send brain waves and advise you on team decisions.
Mike Drowne: this facial hair is also acceptable...
Look, McCourts, if you guys are fans of the game like you've always purported to be, then you should understand that you are making a mockery of one of the storied franchises.
If you were really fans of baseball, you'd sell the Dodgers or step down as owners.
Because at this point, you are not just embarrassing yourselves, you are embarrassing all of us.
Reports today are saying that Frank and Jamie McCourt, owner and CEO (respectively) of the Dodgers are separating.
I don't want to delve too deep into this. As much as you might or might not like the McCourts, you don't want to wish any hardship on them. And separation can be a messy thing, so, I'd like to avoid talking too much about their personal situation.
It's just a little shocking to me, and immediately, I have some questions.
- Is this going to cause a lot of front office commotion? There can't be any way Frank continues to pay Jamie to remain in the team CEO position if they're going through a messy split. Is this going to cause problems when Ned Colletti's contract is up at the end of this season and the team might or might not be looking for a new GM?
- Is this going to lead to a Padres-esque situation? Many of the stories being written are comparing this situation to that of Padres owner John Moores, who is splitting with his wife. As is part of the divorce proceedings, the couple begin to split their possessions. Moores prepared for this process by beginning to slash payroll, trading away bigger contract players for lesser players just to rid the team of contracts. Obviously, you can see the effect this practice has had on the Padres.
- Finally, is this going to lead to a sale of the team? Can McCourt continue to support a major league sports team that he was already having some trouble financially supporting?
Again, just a lot of questions that popped into my head. Who knows? In the end, it might not be a problem.
Or it could. There could be a lot of upheaval coming. We'll see.
Ultimately, I guess it boils down to this for me: a lot of people really care about the Dodgers and I'm just hoping that the team doesn't getting negatively affected as an unfortunate by-product of an already unfortunate situation.
EDIT: There's been some word from Jamie's lawyers that she doesn't intend to step away from her position with the Dodgers. Think about that for a second: a team CEO working for her ex-husband owner. Yeah, that's not going to create any distractions...
I wanted to discuss this last week when the news was breaking, but I didn't quite get around to it.
It seems kinda important to me.
According to Dodgers.com, Jamie McCourt was named CEO of the Dodgers.
This is exciting news. A female CEO of a major sports team. Wow. This, of course, is a promotion for McCourt, who served as Team President for the last several years. She continues to break boundaries with each new step.
The decision is not without controversy however. Some suggest that McCourt's promotion is mainly due to her close relationship with Dodger owner Frank McCourt.
This is not the case. Jamie McCourt is a well educated woman who has spent several difficult years working towards this position.
She started her career with the Dodger organization in 2004 with the humble position of Vice Chairman before being promoted to Team President just a year and a half later.
This came after her long successful career working for other sports teams like... uh... er... well, ok, I guess she never worked for another sports team in a similar position.
Ok, but her bio says "she loved [baseball] as a child." That's a pretty good qualification, right?
Ooo, she joined the Los Angeles Sports Council in 2004. Not bad...
She's also "an avid swimmer." Well, how about that? Swimming is practically a sport!
Hey, if that's not enough experience to be made Vice Chairman of one of the biggest sports franchises in the World, then I don't know what is.
And if a year and a half as Vice Chairman experience isn't enough to allow someone to be Team President, then I don't know what is, either.
And if just four years as Team President experience isn't enough to allow someone to be CEO, well, then... I think you get the point.
So don't tell me this is nepotism at it's worst. Jamie McCourt has a "M.S. (MBA) degree in management from the MIT Sloan School of Management, with a concentration in both organizational learning and corporate finance."
That's a pretty good degree. So obviously, she was the most qualified person that Frank McCourt could find to be CEO of his baseball team.
And I applaud his forward thinking.
Oh, and in other, related news, the Dodgers promoted Dennis Mannion to President/Chief Operating Officer.
I'm not so sure about this one. He's only spent "27 years with the Philadelphia Phillies, Denver Nuggets, Colorado Avalanche and Baltimore Ravens." I guess my biggest issue with him is that he's only been with the Dodgers since 2007.
...and his last name isn't McCourt.
That's ok, it's not like he'll ever be made the CEO, he's only the COO. He and people with similar qualifications (or lack of them for that matter) aren't really CEO material anyway.
That's a job that can really only be done by one person.
The one person that's all the right qualifications.
Jamie McCourt.
So, there's been a lot of talk about something Dodgers President Jamie McCourt said earlier this week.
From the L.A. Times:
"If you bring somebody in to play and pay them, pick a number, $30 million, does that seem a little weird to you?" Jamie McCourt asked in an interview at the Evergreen Recreation Center in East Los Angeles. "That's what we're trying to figure out. We're really trying to see it through the eyes of our fans. We're really trying to understand, would they rather have the 50 fields?"
Now, obviously, there has been a tremendous amount of backlash to this quote. The McCourt's insist they were speaking on a philosophical hypothetical level. Which very well could be the case. However, many are viewing McCourt's words to be something else... a testing of the waters.First off, when did both charity and free agents become mutually exclusive? Why not have both? In any case, should this be just a hypothetical statement, then all is forgiven.
If this statement is really inferring that the McCourt's won't be ponying up some cash to bring in quality free agents this offseason, then there are going to be some issues.
The money that Dodger fans spend on going to games or purchasing merchandise is, at least by my assumptions, going back into the team. 
Yes, I know a lot of it is going into Frank McCourt's pocket, or to pay team President Jamie McCourt's salary. But I still assume the rest of it will go back into the team. It's bad enough when I see ticket prices being raised to Frank McCourt can build some kind of crazy super mall in the front of the stadium, but to think that the money I'm spending is going to be put into something that I'm never going to see the fruits of, then I'm going to start seriously reconsidering where I put my money.
I mean really, putting money into things you don't gain anything from? That's what property taxes are for.
If the McCourt's want to set up a foundation for building baseball fields, then do that, but keep the Dodger money away from the charity money. Those are two different piles of money, as well they should be.
Look, there's still obviously a lot to be seen with the backlash from all this. Will the McCourt's pay for quality free agents or not? Within the next couple months, we'll start to figure out what this all means. I'm not really ready to completely bash the McCourt's yet on some quote that might not mean anything in a few weeks.
But I am a little worried. And quite frankly, Jamie McCourt, if you really want to know what the Dodger fans think, these are the poll results from the L.A. Times:
That's right, folks. The Dodgers mean a lot to a lot of people. You can't even stick poor kids in between Dodgers and their fans. And I'm with them. Don't make us choose between the Dodgers and the kids, because first and foremost, I want my team to win. Is that really so wrong?
Anyway, Happy Thanksgiving people. They'll be a new player profile up tonight. It's Chin-lung Hu. Don't get too excited...
They look like vertical parenthesis for his mouth!
Suddenly, heart-breakingly mustache-less.
Mike Drowne: this facial hair is also acceptable...
