A New Team, an Old Line : Baseball: After 13 seasons, Mike Scioscia is going to the Padres. But he isn’t about to say anything negative about the Dodgers.

For the first time in 14 seasons, Mike Scioscia will not be on the Dodger plane to Vero Beach, Fla., when the catchers, pitchers and injured players, which could account for most of the team, leave for spring training.

Instead, he will be packing his bags for Yuma, Ariz., preparing for his future with the San Diego Padres, ending his association with the organization he has played for since he was 17.

“The (World Series) championships of ’81 and ‘88; the division championships of ’83 and ‘85, and coming down to the last day of the season in ‘80, ‘82, ‘91, the last week of the season in ’90 . . . “ Scioscia said. “Believe me there are so many positive things that happened playing with the Dodgers.

“Think of the ballplayers I had the opportunity to play with, the hall of famers--Don Sutton, possibly (Steve) Garvey. Some of the pitching staff--Burt Hooton, Steve Howe, Bobby Welch, Fernando (Valenzuela), Dave Stewart, Orel Hershiser, Jerry Reuss--there are so many, I know I am leaving some out,” he said.

“These are some of the best pitchers ever to play the game of baseball and to have them all in one career, to have the chance to catch them, it’s great.”

Suddenly, Scioscia stopped reminiscing.

“I hope you are not writing this article like I’m dying,” he said. “My career isn’t over. The Dodgers are great, but I have a lot going for me as far as my family and more baseball ahead of me. I am proud of it, but I’m looking forward to playing for San Diego.”

The mark of a Dodger farm product is that he always says the right thing.

One rainy night last week, Scioscia walked into his living room and matter-of-factly said that he had just agreed to terms with San Diego. He sounded more like a man announcing he had been switched from swing shift to graveyard than one who was leaving an organization in which he had spent half his life.

He sat down on his couch, cradled his daughter Taylor in his arms and said all the right things about how he is looking forward to playing in San Diego. About what a positive move it would be.

He said he had no bitterness about leaving the Dodgers, just disappointment that he wasn’t given the opportunity to make up for last season, the worst of his career.

“Tommy (Lasorda) chewed me out a couple times for the way I was playing and talked to me a couple of other times because, for the most part, he saw it was bothering me the way the team was playing, me included,” Scioscia said.

“He was concerned about my uncertainty for the future and he knew the last thing I wanted to do was go out with a season like that.”

Scioscia cracked his rib last season and had tendinitis in his wrist, but said it was his decision to play anyway. In retrospect, he says, maybe he should have benched himself. The repercussions of his poor season hurt him this winter, when he spent two months unemployed.

“Other guys who, in the near past, have had bad years or been injured have always been given the opportunity by the Dodgers to come back and have a good year,” Scioscia said. “I feel like last year is the first bad year I’ve had in a long time. But then, I can see how the Dodgers would be a little apprehensive with a guy who is 34.”

The Dodgers would probably have kept Scioscia in a tutorial role for prospects Mike Piazza and Carlos Hernandez, but Scioscia wanted more. He wanted a chance to win a starting job. He talked with the Chicago White Sox, and he and former Dodger Steve Sax were excited about the possibility of being reunited. But then the White Sox re-signed Carlton Fisk.

Scioscia ended up signing with the Padres for a reported $300,000, less then a quarter of his salary last season of $1.9 million. The Padres did not guarantee him any role, only a chance. They have a rookie catcher, Dan Walters, listed first on the depth chart.

“If I doubted my ability, I would have worried in the off-season,” Scioscia said. “But I knew that some team was going to give me an opportunity. I have worked very hard this off-season, and am looking forward to next season with the Padres.”

Scioscia compares last season with the Dodgers to moonwalking, so different was the team’s backward slide from the high expectations it had coming out of spring training.

“The toughest part of last year was the first two months of the season, for me anyway, because then I started to realize that the team was a long way away from being competitive,” Scioscia said. “It was almost total shock. And once you get over that point you start to say, ‘Let’s play as hard as we can and see how good we can get.’ ”

It only got worse.

“It was very frustrating because of the great pitching staff we had,” Scioscia said. “If you have a great pitching staff, that’s the No. 1 thing you need to be a winner. I think the pitchers performed under tough circumstances and did well with the worst defense in baseball. And to me, that is being tested by fire.

“I’m not pointing fingers. I am certainly not focusing on any one player on defense. I was part of this too. I had a poor first half of the season. But it was still tough to swallow, especially since we had lost the division by a game the season before. And we never got past a certain stage.”

The Dodgers finished with a 63-99 record, their most defeats since 1908. They finished last for the first time since 1905. Scioscia hit .183 through the first 50 games, then .251 the rest of the season, finishing with a career-low .221 average in 117 games.

But considering how bad things went on the field, Scioscia said the mood in the clubhouse was fine.

“Chemistry in the clubhouse has its positive effects, but I think it is overrated,” he said. “There are guys you may get along great with in the clubhouse, but you get on the field and you don’t know where a guy is in a certain time of a game. Or you don’t have the timing down with a middle infielder for some reason.

“Maybe your batting order doesn’t have the chemistry, with the leadoff man getting on and the guys that drive him in. You need a certain amount of chemistry to win and it’s on the field that makes you win.”

Scioscia was 21 when he was brought up from Albuquerque as the heir apparent to Steve Yeager. Fernando Valenzuela was 19. What ensued in their youth would go down for the ages.

“What Fernando accomplished on the field I knew was special,” Scioscia said. “Coming in and throwing seven shutouts in ’81 and coming up in ’80 in the last month of a season in a pennant race and nobody touched him.

“But I was already so overwhelmed at the atmosphere outside of baseball--the reporters and the fans--Fernandomania was just added on to that. But now, looking back, I can realize how special Fernandomania was.

“Young players have come up and performed as well as Fernando, like Ramon (Martinez). You couldn’t have a first couple of years as well as Ramon had, but you couldn’t have the following Fernando had. To hear, like, Sutton saying, ‘Hey this kid is special.’ They knew. But back then, you take it with a grain of salt.”

Scioscia came up with Rick Sutcliffe, Mickey Hatcher and Pedro Guerrero. By about 1985, many of his minor league teammates had followed and it made for a natural relationship in the clubhouse. By then, Scioscia was a fixture behind home plate, which also made for a natural relationship with the fans.

“L.A. fans are the most supportive fans I have seen in the country,” Scioscia said. “They are forgiving, they are knowledgeable. I would come out after a bad game and go out in the parking lot and sign autographs and fans would say, ‘Hey, Mike don’t worry about it, you’re the best.’ I am going to miss that part of it.

“Even when the (San Francisco) Giants came in town, even with the Giants-Dodgers rivalry, our fans treat them differently here then we are treated there. Maybe I will experience that this year. When the Dodgers went to San Diego, the fans there were very vocal against us. The Dodger fans are there to cheer the Dodgers, whereas sometimes in other parks, like Candlestick, they are there not to cheer the Giants so much as to boo the Dodgers.

“In L.A. no matter who is in town, the L.A. crowd is there to cheer the Dodgers, and anybody who has played for the Dodgers should never take that for granted.”

By the Numbers

A look at the career statistics for catcher Mike Scioscia:

REGULAR SEASON

YEAR TEAM G AB R H HR RBI AVG 1980 Dodgers 54 134 8 34 1 8 .254 1981 Dodgers 93 290 27 80 2 29 .276 1982 Dodgers 129 365 31 80 5 38 .219 1983 Dodgers 12 35 3 11 1 7 .314 1984 Dodgers 114 341 29 93 5 38 .273 1985 Dodgers 141 429 47 127 7 53 .296 1986 Dodgers 122 374 36 94 5 26 .251 1987 Dodgers 142 461 44 122 6 38 .265 1988 Dodgers 130 408 29 105 3 35 .257 1989 Dodgers 133 408 40 102 10 44 .250 1990 Dodgers 135 435 46 115 12 66 .264 1991 Dodgers 119 345 39 91 8 40 .264 1992 Dodgers 117 348 19 77 3 24 .221 Totals 1441 4373 398 1131 68 446 .259

DIVISION SERIES

YEAR OPPONENT G AB R H HR RBI AVG 1981 Houston 4 13 0 2 0 1 .154

CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES

YEAR OPPONENT G AB R H HR RBI AVG 1981 Montreal 5 15 1 2 1 1 133 1983 Philadelphia did not play, injured 1985 St. Louis 6 16 2 4 0 1 .250 1988 New York Mets 7 22 3 8 1 2 364 Totals 18 53 6 14 2 4 .264

WORLD SERIES

YEAR OPPONENT G AB R H HR RBI AVG 1981 New York Yankees 3 4 1 1 0 0 .250 1988 Oakland 4 14 0 3 0 1 .214 Totals 7 18 1 4 0 1 .222

ALL-STAR GAME

YEAR SITE G AB R H HR RBI AVG 1989 Anaheim 1 1 0 0 0 0 .000 1990 Chicago (NL) 1 2 0 0 0 0 .000 Totals 2 3 0 0 0 0 .000