Farm Aid: Dodgers Could Sure Use Some

In the eyes of the Albuquerque Dukes, fan and media criticism of that once-revered Class AAA Pacific Coast League team is no more than an exercise in itchy-finger pointing.

With the parent Los Angeles Dodgers struggling, people are calling sports-talk shows, searching for answers, and some are focusing on the Dukes, suggesting that the club’s primary farm club is not doing its job. According to Duke manager Terry Collins, that’s a spin-the-bottle game of accusations.

“You see, what happens is that when L.A. was winning, nobody gave a (bleep) about us,” Collins said. “All of a sudden, for the first time last year, everybody lost, and now it’s we don’t have any players.

“I know what the big questions are in Los Angeles. The minor league system has been raked over. . . . Where have all the players gone? Well, they’re here. They are still here. It’s just that we’ve got to take our time.”

Some players deflect the criticism of the lack of talent with verbal missiles of their own, pointed right back toward Los Angeles.

“The Dodgers don’t make players. They destroy players,” said Duke catcher Gilberto Reyes, who demanded that he be traded five months ago.

Said second baseman Jack Perconte: “I find it kind of ironic that they’re losing up there and blaming the minor leagues. I don’t understand that part of it.”

Asked about Reyes’ remark, Bill Schweppe, the Dodger vice president in charge of minor league operations, replied: “I don’t know if we destroyed Fernando or the others. I’d rather not comment on that. He’s obviously feeling some frustration.”

After a 54-88 showing, good for last place in both halves of the 1986 PCL season, the Dukes rebounded with a 43-27 record and won the first-half title this year in the Southern Division. They are currently in second place behind Hawaii with a 13-11 record in the second half.

But last year’s showing still lingers in the minds of Collins and General Manager Pat McKernan. It was the worst record in the Dukes’ 15-year history.

It was also the year of the revolving door:

--Collins used 81 different starting lineups in 142 games. That was a result of Dodger, as well as Duke, injuries that necessitated 53 roster changes.

--With the exception of Tim Meeks, who was traded to Oakland, and Brian Holton, who is with the Dodgers, most of last season’s pitching staff is playing at Class-AA San Antonio. One of last year’s pitchers is playing in Class-A Vero Beach. Things got so bad last year that Collins had to activate 38-year-old pitching coach Dave Wallace in August. Wallace threw in four games. Team ERA: 5.04.

--Not a single Duke was named to the PCL All-Star team for the first time since 1976.

--After winning PCL titles in ‘79, ‘80, ’81 and ‘82, and going to the championship series in ‘83, the Dukes have put together records of 62-81 in ‘84, and 67-76 in ’85 to go along with last year’s debacle.

As a result, McKernan requested that the Dodgers provide him with some veteran players. Currently, only 13 of the 23 players on the Dukes’ roster originally signed with the Dodgers.

The move to acquire veteran minor leaguers with some major league experience this year was an effort to keep up with the Joneses in the PCL. The trend, according to McKernan, is to sign experienced players to fill in gaps.

“It was like sending people with hand weapons against people who were bringing in nuclear armaments,” McKernan said. “It was hard to develop a ball player.”

Collins said that the acquisition of such veteran players as Perconte, Brad Wellman, Pete Ladd and Jaime Cocanower was also an effort to allow their younger players more time to develop while surrounding that talent with proven veterans. Last year, players were moving up too rapidly jumping from A ball to AAA ball, such as last season’s pitching staff.

Then there is Jeff Hamilton.

“Maybe we’ve distributed our talent a little fast,” Collins said. “Look at Hamilton. He had a pretty good year in A ball, then he went to AA ball and had a great year but had to sit out half a season with a bad wrist. Last year, he came here half a season and then he’s in the big leagues. We’ve got to take our time.”

But the line between too much time and not enough time can be a fine one. Some players believe that they languish too long in Albuquerque. Such stars as San Francisco’s Candy Maldonado and Jeffrey Leonard, as well as Pittsburgh’s Sid Bream and Cincinnati’s Ted Power, never were able to permanently crack the Dodger roster.

Reyes was called up in 1983 as a 19-year-old and has been up and down since then. Once touted as a great prospect, he said he feels as though he’s run into a brick wall.

“I’m really disappointed,” he said. “I want to be out of here, bad. “

Such remarks are not representative of all Duke players but there is an air of distance between the two clubs. Those players, like Reyes, who are called up from Albuquerque do not believe they are given adequate chances to perform. Reyes was called up in June for two weeks, after Mike Sciosia went on the disabled list. But Reyes played only half an inning.

“They said they’d give me the opportunity to play, but the opportunity never came,” Reyes said. “I was hitting .330 when I left (Albuquerque). When I came back, I lost everything--my stroke, my ability behind the plate, everything. They do the same with Hamilton and (Ralph) Bryant.”

Hamilton is the player the Dukes speak of most. After tearing up the Pacific Coast League with a .381 average in the first month of the season, Hamilton was summoned to Los Angeles to replace struggling Tracy Woodson. He played sparingly at third base after a slow start.

“The kid’s not going to go up there and hit .300 right off the bat,” said infielder Wellman. “You know, (Philadelphia) gave Mike Schmidt two years of hitting .210 and .222 and then he progressed into being a player. You can’t have your cake and eat it too. You’ve got to have some time for adjustment in the big leagues. You’ve got to be in there every day.”

Wellman was hitting .340 when Dodger shortstop Mariano Duncan went down with an injury. The Dodgers, however, passed him by, acquiring Garner instead. Wellman’s average has dropped to .314 and he, too, has asked for a trade.

With the Dodgers struggling to stay in contention, Schweppe believes that they have to play those who have proven they can play at the major league level. Recent acquisitions of Phil Garner, Danny Heep and Tito Landrum over Dodger minor leaguers have drawn criticism. But Schweppe defends those moves.

“It’s simply a case that at the major league level, everyone wants to have a winning ball club,” he said. “And if the talent is available to accomplish that goal, then that’s the nature of the business.”

“If a player is sent back (to Albuquerque) it’s not intended to be a demotion. It’s simply much better to have a player play in Triple-A ball every day then play part-time on the big league level.”

Del Crandall, former Albuquerque manager who won four PCL titles between 1978-1983 and later managed the Seattle Mariners, said that a decision to give a young player a chance in the big leagues in a full-time capacity depends a lot on the organization. In Seattle, with a young expansion team, he had the flexibility to do so.

“But when you’re the Los Angeles Dodgers, I’m not so sure you can do that,” Crandall said. “They have to think about winning. They look at it a little different from an expansion club.”

Crandall and Collins agree that the opportunity to let a promising player like Hamilton play every day with the Dodgers also depends on the supporting cast around him.

But the questions remain. Asked about a recent comment by Dodger Manager Tom Lasorda in USA Today, to the effect that there weren’t any minor leaguers available to step in and help the club, Collins replied:

“That’s his opinion. Unless they give these players the chance, no one knows if they can help them out.”

The Dukes are in a quandary now with two quality third basemen in Hamilton and Tracy Woodson. The Dodgers want both in the Dukes’ lineup every day, so Hamilton will play third and Woodson, hitting .315, will move to first base.

The other logjam is in the outfield, where the Dukes are loaded with prospects. After brief stints with the Dodgers this season, Ralph Bryant and Reggie Williams are back, as is Jose Gonzales, who played with the Dodgers last season. Bryant is hitting .191, Williams .314 and Gonzales .305.

Then there is left fielder Chris Gwynn, brother of San Diego’s Tony and the Dodgers’ first round draft choice in 1985. Duke hitting instructor Ben Hines calls Gwynn, hitting .291, a definite major league prospect. George Hinshaw, a veteran minor leaguer, is hitting .363 but the Dodgers don’t seem interested.

Gwynn, Bryant and Gonzales are the starters.

Another prospect, Mike Ramsey, seemed to have won the Dodger center field job in spring training but was later sent to Albuquerque. Three weeks ago, he was sent to Class-AA San Antonio so he could play everyday. Some sources say the move was also made to allow the Dodgers time to trade Bryant or Williams, whose worth in a trade would drop if either were demoted to San Antonio.

One frequent criticism leveled against the Dukes is that averages are inflated because of the altitude--5,000 feet--and wind that tend to carry the ball. The Dukes play in the Albuquerque Sports Stadium, an attractive, well-kept minor league stadium that provides fans with a view of the Sandia Mountains and an area to park their cars and watch the game in a drive-in section. The dimensions of the field are 410 feet in center, 360 down the left-field line and .340 down the right.

Collins subscribes to the thin-air theory. He says that a spray hitter who makes good contact with the ball can add up to 30 points to his average. A power-hitter tends to lift the ball in the air more with hopes that it will carry itself out of the ballpark, he said. One year, Bream hit 20 home runs for the Dukes, 19 of them in Albuquerque.

McKernan, although he admits that altitude is a consideration, thinks it’s not an issue.

“Things are passed on day in and day out and assumed as gospel,” he said. “No one ever breaks it down and looks in most instances to see if what their saying is true. This is a great game to be a parrot in because if you go along with the flow of everything people say . . . ‘Hey, he must know what he’s talking about.’ ”

The Dukes this year have actually hit more home runs on the road, 41, than at home, 35. The team batting average is .269 on the road and .316 at home.

Collins says that if anything, the hit-happy PCL can be traced to a lack of quality pitching. There is also the question of inflated ERAs and excuses that breaking balls don’t break in the thin air. The Dukes’ ERA is 4.79 at home, compared to 4.69 on the road.

“I just think (the issue of altitude) is overblown,” McKernan said. “I think the reversal should be considered more than anything. I’d rather have my pitchers pitching under conditions that would make them better pitchers.”

A decline at the gate accompanied Albuquerque’s decline on the field the last three years. But this season, the fans are back and the Dukes appear destined to break their single-season record of 295,094 for 69 games, set in 1982.

Albuquerque, the smallest city in the 10-team PCL, has drawn 220,581 for 45 home games with 23 more to go. That leads the league both in total and average attendance, 4,902.

“When you consider the metro area is 400,000 and we’ve drawn 220,000 at this part of the season, we’ve done well,” McKernan said. “Percentage-wise we draw as good as anyone in the game.

“Of course, it’s the only game in town,” added McKernan, who, with Bob Lozinak, bought the club from the Dodgers for $330,000 in 1979. “But if you come here and the place is dirty and the prices are exorbitant, people don’t come back. The Dukes just have a good reputation.”

That reputation, isn’t what it used to be outside of Albuquerque, though, Collins said. And rebuilding takes time.

“We may not have the dozens of prospects we had years ago in Marshalls, Guerreros and Brocks,” Collins said. “But I think there are players here who could help the Dodgers. I just think it’s a matter of time. Maybe one of these days, Tommy is going to slam Hamilton in the lineup.”

Although, perplexed with Dodger decisions sometimes, Collins refuses to point his own finger.

“Are we showing enough patience?” he asked, repeating the question? “I don’t know that. I cannot make those decisions. . . . I can sit here and bad-mouth the (bleep) out of everybody but what good is it going to do? Because they can bad-mouth me, too, because I’ve had some tough years.

“Sometimes, I think what Tommy Lasorda is doing is wrong. But that’s his decision and he’s going to have to live with it. He’s going to have to pay the consequences whether they’re good or bad.”