A Marshall Plan: Put Him at First, Guerrero at Third

Let’s start this off with the debatable premise that the Dodgers need help.

The Dodgers would have us all believe that with the new talent they’ve rounded up for the coming season, all player fan mail should be addressed directly to Cooperstown.

The truth, though, is that while the parts are there for a potentially awesome machine, some assembly will be required, and batteries are not included.

It’s a big challenge, a scary situation. Why do you think Kirk Gibson’s hair was standing on end at Monday’s press conference?

Today the Dodgers will courageously unveil their 1987 highlights film, presumably on the theory that those who do not remember the past are condemned to re-live it. The film will be dazzling, but I’m not sure I’m ready for a highlight movie that has for background music Patsy Cline’s “I Fall to Pieces.”

Better we should all press on to the future, to helping the Dodgers answer their current questions. Whom to trade, what to trade them for, where to play the people they’ve got? I’ve been giving it a lot of thought, and the best idea I’ve come up with so far is to trade Tommy Lasorda for a reliable journeyman general manager, and move Fred Claire to first-base coach.

However, just in time for today’s column, I plucked a rare gem out of the old mailbag. Dodger fan Bruce Rutledge of Santa Barbara, the city famed as the home of Shay Torrent, sent me a copy of a letter he wrote to Claire.

Using dazzling logic, Rutledge outlined a game plan. Essentially he said: Make no more trades, put Pedro Guerrero at third base and Mike Marshall at first.

The lineup: Steve Sax (2b), John Shelby (cf), Gibson (lf), Guerrero (3b), Marshall (1b), Mike Davis (rf), Mike Scioscia (c), Alfredo Griffin (ss).

“Follow my logic,” Bruce the Fan wrote, then neatly outlined the benefits of his proposed lineup:

1. Excellent team power and speed.

2. Excellent right-left hitting balance.

3. As good (if not better) defense as the current plan of Guerrero (1b)-Sax (3b)-Mariano Duncan (2b). Marshall better target at 1b, Sax and Guerrero at familiar positions; more mature Guerrero can handle 3b as well as Sax; need power from 3b.

4. Solid middle-of-batting-order, which Dodgers have lacked since days of Smith-Garvey-Baker-Cey.

5. Lasorda at his best when managing a set-lineup, power-hitting team.

6. Enough starters can interchange positions, freeing up others for trade bait, such as Franklin Stubbs and Duncan.

7. Trading Pedro for any pitcher(s) is a bad risk, considering Pedro’s heavy production last year. He’s the key to the lineup.

8. Dodger pitching staff is still better than 75% of the staffs of other league clubs.

Hey, it all makes sense to me. I like the overriding philosophy: When in doubt, pound the baseball. The game’s greatest healer, as Earl Weaver always pointed out, is Dr. Longball.

A few problems remain, though.

Guerrero doesn’t like third base. It’s the bag that once sadistically broke his ankle, remember? And the last time the Dodgers tried playing him at third, Pedro threatened to quit baseball and become a Raider running back.

Comment: So what? Sax is not in love with the warm corner, either. Are the Dodgers paying these guys to play baseball, or to general-manage? And if Pedro’s going to botch up a position, better third than first.

If the Dodgers let the players choose their own favorite positions, the team will have five people in the outfield and two in the infield, which will leave the defense highly vulnerable to the bunt.

Another problem: Assuming the Dodgers heed Bruce the Fan’s advice, which surely they will, what will Lasorda do the second day of the season, when six starters scratch from the lineup with pulled hamstrings?

This is the team, remember, that lost a player to one game last year due to what was officially listed as “general soreness.”

The Dodgers, for the last few years a team without a true spiritual leader in the clubhouse, now have one--General Soreness.

It’s likely to be a race to see which the Dodgers will injure more of this season--hamstrings or heartstrings. If Marshall and Gibson shake hands, one will break a finger and the other will hyper-extend an elbow, and Phil Garner will come out of retirement to challenge the winner.

This is the only team required to post a Surgeon General’s notice on its uniform--”Warning. Due to some strange hex, playing for this team may be hazardous to your body. And your mind ain’t too safe, either.”

But this is no time to think negative. It’s time for one last, candy-coated video look back at last season, then on to the future.

And as one wise Dodger fan--or is that a contradiction in terms?--points out, there is hope for 1988.