Oh, My! O’Malley Is Perfect

Peter O’Malley is offering himself as the brave heart who will lead the crusade to bring professional football back to Los Angeles. Let’s let O’Malley know that we are behind him, absolutely, 100%.

I can think of at least five reasons the Dodger Stadium caretaker should run our next NFL franchise:

1. Location.

2. Location.

3. Location.

4. O’Malley would be that rare NFL owner who never makes a fool of himself.

5. This could mean far more opportunities for Japanese football stars.

As a site, the Chavez Ravine property is ideal. We need another team downtown like we need another Angelique billboard. Furthermore, I trust Peter O’Malley, implicitly. Don’t ask why. To me, he’s as solid and stolid as the “American Gothic” farmer with the pitchfork. I don’t know about you, but I’m sick of slick.

Meanwhile, our do-little mayor, Dick (the NFL Stops Here) Riordan, who makes football teams disappear the way David Copperfield makes elephants disappear, has organized a task force called Football LA, a leading contender for Oxymoronic Title of 1995.

The task force purportedly has been conducting helicopter surveys of potential football sites, probably playing Wagner’s “The Ride of the Valkyries” while they fly. Aside from being the only copter in California not following an automobile chase for the TV news, this is a task force that is scouting a battleground for a nonexistent army.

We have no team. It is very difficult to play in the NFL without a team. The league is funny that way. I scoured the NFL rule book, and sure enough, there it is on Page 1: “To play in the National Football League, we strongly advise that you begin by having a team.”

What we want is a brand-new team. We do not want some hand-me-down. We do not want a bunch of bums, like the Seattle Seahawks or Arizona Cardinals. Nor do we want a bunch of punks, like the Seattle Seahawks or Nebraska Cornhuskers.

No, we want a nice, fresh, squeaky-clean, no-baggage, no-skeletons, nameless, faceless expansion club, the kind we can name and raise from birth, like a puppy.

Certain sour-grape eaters said we were lucky to lose the Raiders, because they weren’t all that wonderful, on or off the field. Some of these same people then proposed that we go after the Seahawks, compared to whom the Raiders are about as naughty and nasty as 45 Cal Ripkens, and not born losers, either. Seahawks? We don’t need no stinking Seahawks.

This is another reason I support Peter O’Malley’s circumspect pursuit of a pro football franchise for Los Angeles, because I believe he would act responsibly to maintain a level of quality and even affordability. I might rue writing this, but somehow I don’t see an O’Malley-run operation gouging L.A.’s fans for personal seat licenses that cost slightly more than Charlie Sheen’s tab with Heidi Fleiss.

Here in the land of 10 a.m. Sunday football and before-dark Monday football, other contenders exist to restore the NFL to our shores. Disney hasn’t launched any billion-dollar enterprises for several days now. Marvin Davis’ name has also been mentioned, which is fine, aside from the “Davis to Own L.A. Team” headlines that will jolt readers into thinking that it’s Al.

But come Tuesday, when the NFL Stadium Committee presents its findings to the general ownership at a league meeting in Atlanta, I am crossing my fingers, hoping that Peter O’Malley’s little palm-treed lot is their place of choice.

It’s a clean and convenient setting. He’s a clean and conventional owner. He won’t dance on the sideline like Tom Benson, make vulgar jokes like Victor Kiam, smooch players like Georgia Frontiere, sue the league like Al Davis or flout the league’s rules like Jerry Jones. No, O’Malley will simply do what he has done best: Stand there and own.

I intend to help him, any way I can. Should he need money, I will raise it, even if it means taking a pledge from Jerry Lewis. Because a football arena next door to Dodger Stadium would be the best thing to happen to Los Angeles since we got that baseball team from O’Malley’s old man.