This is how I feel about the 2013 Dodgers

[ShadyJ]

Who wants some side action on the series winner? Ill take STL at even money. Its Sox-125 on Bovada. If I dont know you we will have to escrow with Druff.

I'll do $50 with you & take the Sox.

Edit: If you accept post back here & we can escrow with Druff since I think he wants/requires that. Not to mention I'll most likely be in Seattle when the series ends & if you win you'd probably get the $ a little quicker than waiting for my return.

Booked.

Im pretty sure Druff knows were both good for it. Either way is fine with me. Im not concerned about getting as soon as it ends I know you're good for it.

[Hockey Guy]

I'll do $50 with you & take the Sox.

Edit: If you accept post back here & we can escrow with Druff since I think he wants/requires that. Not to mention I'll most likely be in Seattle when the series ends & if you win you'd probably get the $ a little quicker than waiting for my return.

Booked.

Im pretty sure Druff knows were both good for it. Either way is fine with me. Im not concerned about getting as soon as it ends I know you're good for it.

Booked, Gl to you sir.

 

Just kidding, i hope the Cards get no-hit every game now.

[Pooh]

A number of managerial/coaching things happened with the Dodgers recently.

It came out that Mattingly had an option that automatically paid him $1.4 million for 2014 if the Dodgers won the NLDS. It was rumored when he started Kershaw on short rest in NLDS Game 4 that Mattingly was doing this selfishly, to preserve his job. This was BEFORE it was known about the $1.4 million option. Now it looks obvious that Mattingly started Kershaw because it was worth $1.4 million to him to win that series.

With the auto-renewal for 2014, Mattingly now has a lot more power. He decided to call out the Dodgers front office and demand a multi-year deal, knowing that the worst thing that could happen would be getting fired and keeping $1.4 million for doing nothing.

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/s...-return-option

Now the Dodgers are being forced to either quickly fire him or quickly hammer out a multi-year deal.

Mattingly is also unhappy that close friend Trey Hillman was fired from the Dodgers' coaching staff. He was Mattingly's bench coach.

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/s...attingly-fired

Mattingly wanted him back, but someone (presumably Coletti) fired Hillman for unknown reasons. The rest of the coaching staff was brought back or is in the process of being brought back, including Davey Lopes (1B), Tim Wallach (3B), Rick Honeycutt (pitching), Chuck Crim (bullpen), and John Valentin (assistant hitting). Mark McGwire (hitting) was already in a multi-year deal, and will return in 2014.

Most surprisingly, trainer Sue Falsone resigned on Monday, claiming she wanted to "pursue other opportunities" in her career. What?! Exactly what other opportunities exist in the training world better than head trainer on a huge-market MLB team?

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/s...ngeles-dodgers

Falsone was the first female trainer in baseball. She was well-liked by players. Rumors are that her resignation was a result of embarrassment over the Dodgers' numerous injuries, especially those to star players Andre Ethier, Hanley Ramirez, Matt Kemp, Chad Billingsley, Josh Beckett, and Carl Crawford. She wasn't to blame for most (or all) of these, but it still looks bad, especially with the Dodgers having a MLB-high 25 players on the DL during the season. She also might have resigned out of fear of being fired due to this situation.

I'm not into conspiracy theories like you are so I disagree regarding Mattingly trying to win the game for his 1.4m. The guy had to win one game out of two and he chose to have his two best starters go. Its as simple as that and he said it himself on the Dan Patrick Show. Then Kershaw pitched game two on normal rest the next series. If you don't like your manager then fine, but quit the bullshit you are reading on the Internet over there. If he didn't go with Kershaw and they lost both games you would be like fire that asshole for not having Kershaw go when he could have.

Also grow up and lose this crybaby shit about having half the team injured for the series. St. Louis played Pete Kozma at short and Jon Jay at center field for fucks sake. A 10% Hanley and a 60% Eithier are better than those guys. You had a stacked team and you were playing against Beltran, Holliday and a bunch of scrubs and got your asses handed to you fair and square.

I hope you trade away your whole farm system for Price. Then maybe you'll have a chance to get a world series before your team is full of old, injury prone, over paid PED users. That's why your players are always hurt and breaking down by the way. The teams with the 20 million dollar players have all the users at the tail ends of their careers while teams like the Rays get many good years from these guys then rebuild with your best young players while you get stuck with the huge contracts and the players on the DL all year.

[gut]

I doubt Mattingly has any more "power" simply due to the option vesting. This is a team that is now willing to throw 200m to their roster, I doubt 1.4m makes a huge difference to them. If they want him gone I'm sure they would just do it and pay it out.

[Dan Druff]

A number of managerial/coaching things happened with the Dodgers recently.

It came out that Mattingly had an option that automatically paid him $1.4 million for 2014 if the Dodgers won the NLDS. It was rumored when he started Kershaw on short rest in NLDS Game 4 that Mattingly was doing this selfishly, to preserve his job. This was BEFORE it was known about the $1.4 million option. Now it looks obvious that Mattingly started Kershaw because it was worth $1.4 million to him to win that series.

With the auto-renewal for 2014, Mattingly now has a lot more power. He decided to call out the Dodgers front office and demand a multi-year deal, knowing that the worst thing that could happen would be getting fired and keeping $1.4 million for doing nothing.

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/s...-return-option

Now the Dodgers are being forced to either quickly fire him or quickly hammer out a multi-year deal.

Mattingly is also unhappy that close friend Trey Hillman was fired from the Dodgers' coaching staff. He was Mattingly's bench coach.

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/s...attingly-fired

Mattingly wanted him back, but someone (presumably Coletti) fired Hillman for unknown reasons. The rest of the coaching staff was brought back or is in the process of being brought back, including Davey Lopes (1B), Tim Wallach (3B), Rick Honeycutt (pitching), Chuck Crim (bullpen), and John Valentin (assistant hitting). Mark McGwire (hitting) was already in a multi-year deal, and will return in 2014.

Most surprisingly, trainer Sue Falsone resigned on Monday, claiming she wanted to "pursue other opportunities" in her career. What?! Exactly what other opportunities exist in the training world better than head trainer on a huge-market MLB team?

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/s...ngeles-dodgers

Falsone was the first female trainer in baseball. She was well-liked by players. Rumors are that her resignation was a result of embarrassment over the Dodgers' numerous injuries, especially those to star players Andre Ethier, Hanley Ramirez, Matt Kemp, Chad Billingsley, Josh Beckett, and Carl Crawford. She wasn't to blame for most (or all) of these, but it still looks bad, especially with the Dodgers having a MLB-high 25 players on the DL during the season. She also might have resigned out of fear of being fired due to this situation.

I'm not into conspiracy theories like you are so I disagree regarding Mattingly trying to win the game for his 1.4m. The guy had to win one game out of two and he chose to have his two best starters go. Its as simple as that and he said it himself on the Dan Patrick Show. Then Kershaw pitched game two on normal rest the next series. If you don't like your manager then fine, but quit the bullshit you are reading on the Internet over there. If he didn't go with Kershaw and they lost both games you would be like fire that asshole for not having Kershaw go when he could have.

Also grow up and lose this crybaby shit about having half the team injured for the series. St. Louis played Pete Kozma at short and Jon Jay at center field for fucks sake. A 10% Hanley and a 60% Eithier are better than those guys. You had a stacked team and you were playing against Beltran, Holliday and a bunch of scrubs and got your asses handed to you fair and square.

I hope you trade away your whole farm system for Price. Then maybe you'll have a chance to get a world series before your team is full of old, injury prone, over paid PED users. That's why your players are always hurt and breaking down by the way. The teams with the 20 million dollar players have all the users at the tail ends of their careers while teams like the Rays get many good years from these guys then rebuild with your best young players while you get stuck with the huge contracts and the players on the DL all year.

The above like the ranting of an angry Devil Rays fan.

St. Louis was missing Allen Craig. I guess you could also say Rafael Furcal and Chris Carpenter, but they were never expected to contribute this year. Craig is significant, but nothing compared to all of the aforementioned injuries the Dodgers were dealing with.

Ethier was nowhere near 60%. Both he and Hanley Ramirez looked terrible throughout the NLCS, and it was clearly "playing in severe pain" terrible, rather than "slumping" terrible.

The Dodgers NLCS lineup was pretty much Adrian Gonzalez, Carl Crawford, Yasiel Puig, and a bunch of mediocre hitters or injured players. This would have been fine if the Dodgers could have dominated with pitching, but given Wacha's ability to be unhittable since September, it became very tough. The pitching was actually very good on the Dodgers' end, aside from that one terrible game at the end.

I don't care about the Dodgers being stuck with overpriced, declining players, provided they are still willing to keep spending money to improve the team when this happens.

Regarding Mattingly, I don't think the Dodgers care about the 1.4 million, but it seems that he clearly does. He suddenly got some balls to demand a multi-year contract once that option kicked in, while he kept his mouth shut prior to that. Why didn't he say these things during the season? Because he didn't want to get fired before reaching that NLDS milestone. He's in a position of strength simply because he now feels empowered to be the aggressor, whereas before he was walking on egg shells.

Think of a woman in a pre-nup marriage to some rich asshole, and the pre-nup says she gets a minimum of $1.4 million if the marriage lasts 2 years. At the 2-year mark, she might give the guy an ultimatum to start treating her better or she's walking. The guy may be rich enough not to give a shit about $1.4 million, but if it's important enough to her, then he is the one forced to make a decision to her ultimatum, as he knows she'll happily walk at that point if things don't improve.

[Pooh]

lol @ Devil Rays. I'm a Rays fan because I live down here although I was a Sox fan my entire life when I lived up north. We've grown accustomed to losing star players to teams who will overspend long ago. It doesn't really bother us since I'm sure you know we've been in the playoffs for a few years now playing in the most difficult division. The Rays are respected, trust me.

Like I said in my previous post. We trade our "studs" for your prospects and draft picks. IE Garza and Shields. Fuck, Shields brought in Wil Myers and Shields sucks compared to Price. We'll get your stud SS Seager and we'll be happy about it. Price isn't even the best pitcher on the Rays.

There will come a point where your team will no longer spend money and they will be stuck with old, overpaid, underperforming PED users...ala the Yankees. The Yankees will suck for 5 years imo. Be happy if you sneak a WS in the next three because the Dodgers will be the Yankees by 2016.

[Dan Druff]

I will be okay trading one World Series year for a few fail years to follow.

I just don't want to see a Lakers-like disaster where the "stacked" team is an epic failure, and then it falls apart and the team is left with nothing and no direction.

But basketball and baseball are two very different sports. If you're willing to spend money in baseball, you can pretty much right the ship (and at least become decent) unless the front office is run by complete morons.

[Dan Druff]

BTW I think Gonzalez will be productive for several more years, and Greinke will probably be good throughout most or all of his contract.

Hanley Ramirez should also be good for several more years, if he stays healthy.

Those three were the main high-priced pieces the Dodgers picked up, and none of them were failures.

Beckett and Crawford did not live up to their salaries, but they weren't expected to.

The 2013 Dodgers were not like the Angels of the past two years, who paid big $ for Hamilton and Pujols, expected huge production, and both have failed thus far. Imagine how bad the Angels would be if Trout didn't somewhat rescue them.

[Dan Druff]

Dodgers reportedly making an attempt to keep Mark Ellis, making him a bench player (and insurance in case Guerrero isn't ready).

If Ellis is willing, I think that's great. He'd be a good asset on the bench, and will be turning 37 in June, so he might have a hard time getting a starting job on other teams anyway.

[son of lockman]

Mattingly will return for his fourth season as the Dodgers manager with only one change to his coaching staff.
The Dodgers fired bench coach Trey Hillman in October, but will retain Tim Wallach, who will move from third-base coach to bench coach. Wallach had interviewed for managerial jobs with the Detroit Tigers and Seattle Mariners.
Lorenzo Bundy is the only addition to the coaching staff. He will take over as third-base coach after managing the team's Class AAA affiliate in Albuquerque.
Also returning are hitting coaches Mark McGwire and John Valentine, pitching coaches Rick Honeycutt and Ken Howell, first-base coach Davey Lopes and bullpen coach Chuck Crim.
Part-time coaches Manny Mota and Steve Yeager were also retained.


http://sports.yahoo.com/news/matting...5692--mlb.html

[gut]

Interesting that 2 of the first moves now early on in free agency involved the dodgers losing both of their glue guys/hustle guys/play multiple positions guys from their bench. Punto signed very quickly with Oakland, and Schumaker signing today with the Reds. Granted neither of them hit well, but the Dodgers did rely heavily on them. They must be feeling comfortable with the health of their team for the upcoming season, I can't imagine that the Dodgers are trying to cut costs letting those guys go, as if they replace them with younger guys, the ~$4-5 million they save is a drop in the bucket for that team.

[Hockey Guy]

Looks like Beckett might be able to help them this upcoming season:

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/s...s-ready-season

[Sanlmar]

Looks like Beckett might be able to help them this upcoming season:

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/mlb/s...s-ready-season

Becket's shoulder is still junk. It was common knowledge amongst the physical therapists and orthopedic surgeons in the Boston area. Kids with similar injuries a few years ago were offered the story of Becket as an example of how nearly every pitcher suffers some degree of shoulder damage. So do your shoulder exercises kid!

He was a great athlete and pitcher and his skill and muscle memory allowed him to periodically overcome this fact. But he is still damaged goods.

I bet his thoracic syndrome was a secondary symptom or injury brought about by his struggle to compensate for the shoulder.