Did Anybody Think Lasorda Would Retire?

“I don’t tell people my problems,” Tom Lasorda told me, when his Dodger uniform appeared to be hanging by a thread. “And you know why? Because 80% of the people out there don’t give a damn about your problems, and the other 20% are happy that you got ‘em.”

Problems? No problems.

Tommy, the baseball opera, continues.

Lasorda got his fondest wish, being rehired Monday for another season in the Dodger dugout. Anybody wants that shirt with the 2 on the back, they’ll have to rip it off him.

You know that impulsive Peter O’Malley, always changing managers every 20 years or so.

Tony LaRussa, Davey Johnson, Sparky Anderson, they might be available, but the Dodgers will let other organizations fight over them. I thought an “outsider” might finally run this outfit, but no.

As for Bill Russell, it might be time to begin tossing his cap into some other rings. He has been a good George Bush, patiently waiting in the wings to take over, but the more years go by, the more he risks becoming Dan Quayle.

“He’s been very dedicated to the organization,” Lasorda said of Russell, when someone asked him to nominate his own replacement. Russell’s was the only name he spoke.

Frankly, I thought Tommy looked a little dazed in recent weeks, from the way people kept harping on the subject of his stepping down.

One television interview program dedicated an entire segment to it. Lasorda volleyed every question, but after a while, I could detect a look of puzzlement on his face that more or less said, “Hey, where am I going?”

Foolish people expected him to retire voluntarily, to admit, the way players do, that he can’t quite cut it anymore.

Lasorda would rather bite his tongue than say such a thing. He will never, ever retire. Someone will have to retire him.

Mike Piazza, who must have fielded 1,000 questions about Lasorda recently, second only to the 10,000 about Hideo Nomo, fully expected the manager back all along.

“I can’t imagine playing with the Dodgers without Tommy there,” Piazza said.

He won’t need to, until 1997 or later.

The Dodger catcher is not impartial on this subject, having known Lasorda practically from the crib. Nevertheless, he did give the matter due deliberation, not blurting out some mindless response, when asked point-blank whether Lasorda would return.

“I think so,” Piazza said. “The Dodgers are a team that has consistently throughout their history never wanted to get into a revolving-door policy at the management level.”

And any problems the team had? How responsible was Lasorda for those?

“I’d like to say probably not responsible at all,” Piazza said.

“I don’t think there’s a manager who prepares his team better for a season than Tommy does. It’s just not his fault, the problems that we’ve had this year. Defensively, offensive inconsistency . . . you can’t blame him for that.”

The buck stops on the manager’s desk, though. Lasorda knows that, better than anybody.

Had Raul Mondesi not limped off that Dodger bench and slugged a home run at San Diego on the second-to-last night of the season, it is possible that Tom Lasorda’s 19-year career as manager would not have continued beyond that weekend. That’s why so many people were asking questions.

If the Colorado Rockies and Houston Astros had overtaken the Dodgers over those final two days, would O’Malley have renewed Lasorda’s contract? We’ll probably never know.

All I know is, I wrote about 4,000 words on Lasorda the other day, and did not exhaust the subject.

On the record, players and former players, to a man, told me that Lasorda’s record speaks for itself, that he was always good to them, that he deserves to stay.

Off the record, players and former players, more than a few, said that Lasorda has lost it, that he is more show-biz than strategy, that the Dodgers should have had Cleveland’s record with all that talent.

Lasorda himself said, “Walter Alston managed in the majors 23 years. That’s tougher than a pitcher throwing a no-hitter. That’s as tough as a guy hitting 60 home runs. Twenty-three years. And here I am, 19 years now. It boggles the mind, I’ll tell ya.”

Not O’Malley’s mind, it doesn’t.