BASEBALL / ROSS NEWHAN : Realignment Might Prove a Blessing for Dodgers

Call it rebuilding, remodeling, recycling or rehabilitation. The label doesn’t matter.

Nor is the challenge of extricating the Dodgers from the slag pile and making them competitive again as daunting as it seems.

If the American and National leagues realign into three divisions each, the Dodgers could become an instant title contender without Vice President Fred Claire making another move. Some would call that a blessing in more ways than one.

The Dodgers will play in the National League West with the Colorado Rockies and San Diego Padres. They will only have to beat the San Francisco Giants, no easy task as illustrated by their current 18 1/2-game deficit, but easier than winning in a division of seven teams.

In the meantime, nothing gets Claire more upset than the suggestion that the Dodgers are without direction. They have a direction, he insists. There’s just no name for it.

“The label doesn’t concern me,” he said a few days after sending Eric Davis to the Detroit Tigers, opening left field for Billy Ashley or Raul Mondesi, both of whom could be starting for the Dodgers next year if Claire doesn’t pick up Brett Butler’s option.

“We’re trying to be competitive while bringing in our young players,” he said. “If that’s rebuilding, fine. Term it what you want.

“But if we were totally rebuilding, I wouldn’t be talking about the importance of Jody Reed, Tim Wallach and Brett Butler. We wouldn’t have a pitching staff of Orel Hershiser, Tom Candiotti, Jim Gott, Roger McDowell and Todd Worrell. How’s that rebuilding?”

Rebuilding suggests collapse and starting from scratch. It suggests San Diego.

The Dodgers aren’t rebuilding as much as re-emphasizing internal growth.

“As I said at the time, the Davis move is as basic as it can be,” Claire said. “I mean, do you play a veteran player eligible for free agency in September (of a season in which you have no chance to win) or do you go with a talented young player who has had an outstanding year at triple-A?

“If that’s not the direction we’re going in, Mike Piazza wouldn’t be here, Eric Karros wouldn’t be here. What was the logic in keeping Davis?”

What was the logic in trading for him? What was the logic in giving up a pair of talented pitchers--Tim Belcher and John Wetteland--for an oft-injured outfielder whose ability to recapture his enormous ability seemed suspect at the time, and remains so?

“A difficult trade,” Claire said, suggesting in his words and tone a disagreement within the Dodger family, particularly over Wetteland, who was 25 at the time and had the most lively of arms--but no role. He apparently was another victim of an impatient Dodger management unwilling to give him the time to shed the pressure and settle into a role.

Wetteland has 68 saves in two years as the Montreal Expos’ closer, which also says something about the Cincinnati Reds, who had him for five minutes before sending him to the Expos for outfielder Dave Martinez.

“You have to go back to that time,” Claire said. “No one liked Wetteland more than I did, but he was out of options. We had a primarily left-handed hitting lineup, and Tommy (Lasorda), the coaches and our major league scouts felt the thing we needed most was a right-handed power hitter.

“We felt that with our medical staff and training facilities, that in coming home, Eric had a chance to rebound. You can look back now and say the trade didn’t work, that Eric didn’t have the type of years we had hoped for, but those are the risks of trading.

“You can also look back and try to learn, and I think that what we learned from this again was that when you have talented young players, you have to stay with them and give them the opportunity to have success with your organization.

“There’s always going to be disagreements, but hopefully you all learn something from them.”

Ashley and Mondesi now provide Claire, Lasorda and the Dodgers another chance to prove they have learned.

A longtime American League scout who works the Pacific Coast League said of the two outfielders, “Both have talent, both have problems, both deserve the chance to play.

“Ashley can hit balls as far as Juan Gonzalez, but has holes as big as the Grand Canyon. He may not even foul the ball against premier pitchers, but the pitching is so bad in the big leagues, there are so many donkeys, that he may hit 20 to 25 home runs by accident. He is a bad outfielder, but they can work with him on that.

“The other kid (Mondesi) can do it all. He can run, throw, field, hit with power. He has good bat speed, but with all of that he’s not a player yet. But that, too, may come.”

The Dodgers will know more by the end of the season. They have to make a call on Butler’s option by Oct. 31. Darryl Strawberry’s felony arrest Saturday further confuses the picture. Could Ashley and Mondesi both start in ‘94?

“I wouldn’t rule it out,” Claire said.

WHO’S A SCHMO?

A story has emerged from the final hours of the Dodgers’ attempt to sign Darren Dreifort to the effect that a frustrated John Dreifort, the pitcher’s father and interim vice president of academic affairs at Wichita State, told Claire he was a schmo. Or, perhaps, it was a schnook.

Claire insists it never happened, that there was never any name calling, never a heated exchange.

Dreifort said he had a frank exchange with Claire, but didn’t recall using the words schnook or schmo.

” . . . I have said before that I don’t want to be played for a schnook,” he said. “Schmo is not my word. It’s not in my vocabulary.”

Of the final hours leading up to the $1.3-million signing, Dreifort said: “I thought we had compromised all along. At the end, there were places I thought the Dodgers could do some things as symbolic gestures that would have made the final agreement a much more happy situation.”

DAVIS TO STAY?

With Rob Deer having been traded to Boston, Milt Cuyler an injury bust, Dan Gladden and Kirk Gibson both 36, no team speed and no young outfielders on the horizon, and having had to use catcher Mickey Tettleton and infielder Tony Phillips in the outfield at times, the Tigers will apparently attempt to buy out his free agency and retain Davis, who at 31 still raises hopes.

Said Phillips: “Once he sees (the dimensions of) Tiger Stadium, he’s going to want to stay. Nobody is going to have to do any selling.”

SMITH TRADE

Having failed to pay the price for pitching or any other help while still in the National League East race, it was not surprising that the austerity-minded brewery that owns the St. Louis Cardinals would unload Lee Smith once they were out of the race.

He is 35 and eligible for free agency when the season ends. He has 43 saves as the only reliever to have recorded 40 or more for three consecutive seasons, but he had also blown seven save opportunities, given up 11 home runs in 50 1/3 innings and had a 4.50 earned-run average, high for a premier reliever.

Said Atlanta Manager Bobby Cox: “He isn’t the same Lee Smith. He’s still tough, but he isn’t as effective pitching two days in a row anymore.”

With no intention of re-signing him, the Cardinals viewed the trade with the New York Yankees as a last chance to get something for a possibly fading star. It was also a solid move for the Yankees, who were forced to put save leader Steve Farr on the disabled list as they try to hold on in the AL East.

For Smith, the trade to a contender awakened memories of a promotional gathering he had attended with all-time save leaders Rollie Fingers, Goose Gossage, Jeff Reardon and Bruce Sutter, and his realization that he was the only one of the five who hadn’t pitched in a World Series.

“There were five guys with 300 saves, and I was the only one with a zero in the World Series column,” Smith said. “That’s when it dawned on me and it’s been on my mind as another motivation for the last two or three years. This might be the best chance I’ve had, and it might be a last chance.”

The Cardinals, meanwhile, will test Mike Perez in the closer role. He was 5-2 with a 2.08 earned-run average as Smith’s setup man, but he didn’t seem thrilled by this more prominent assignment.

“The media makes the closer role bigger than it is, and I don’t like that,” he said. “The money would be better, but unless we’re talking about millions of dollars, I think I can make a good career without it.”

PHILLIES’ CHOICE

Philadelphia General Manager Lee Thomas, with the NL East title virtually wrapped up, said his preference is to play the Giants in the playoffs.

“Some of our people feel good about playing Atlanta because we’ve held our own (winning five of nine games), but even though San Francisco has beaten up on us (8-4), I’d prefer to play a team that hasn’t been there for a while.

“It’s not a knock at San Francisco, but anybody in their right mind would prefer playing somebody other than the Braves because of their pitching and postseason experience. I’ll take my chances with the Giants. They’re green like we are.”

GIANTS ROLL

San Francisco has led the NL West for 117 consecutive days, but it hasn’t been an easy run. The Giants play their 136th game today, and they will have started their eight regulars in only 23 of them.

They have put three-fourths of their infield, two-thirds of their outfield and two-fifths of their rotation on the disabled list at various times.

Catcher Kirk Manwaring, shortstop Royce Clayton and reserves Mark Carreon and Todd Benzinger are the only non-pitchers from the opening-day roster who have not been on the disabled list.

Center fielder Darren Lewis returned from it Saturday. Will Clark is eligible to come off next weekend, but the ligament strain in his left knee might keep him out longer.

Manager Dusty Baker said his team has coped with adversity from day one and is mentally equipped to handle the Braves’ challenge because of it.

“I’m not alibiing or making excuses because no one cares and no one will buy it, but any time you have to use second-line players against front-line players it definitely makes it tougher,” he said. “But I also think it has made us stronger.”