Dodgers Won’t Even Labor to Win the West This Time

Opening day, so let’s swing for the fences. . . .

The Dodgers will not defeat the San Diego Padres in a final-week pennant race.

What, you think I’m falling into that same trap again?

This time the Dodgers finish them off by Labor Day.

The best Vaughn in baseball will be Greg.

The best Valentin will be John.

The best Rocket will be Valdes.

The best recording of John Fogerty’s “Centerfield” will be a broken one.

The best knuckleball pitcher working out of a bullpen will be Tom Candiotti.

If you think the Dodgers are foolish to use a knuckleball pitcher in the bullpen, so do they.

The best trade they could make is Candiotti to the Angels for a bag of balls. Keeps a good guy in town, breaks a 21-year-old cold shoulder.

Roberto Alomar will have the smallest strike zone in the history of the sport.

Randy Johnson will have the biggest.

The person who devised a schedule that features Yankees versus Mets will be hailed as a genius.

The person who thinks anybody will watch Cleveland versus Houston is an idiot.

The people who avoid the four games between the Dodgers and Angels can explain themselves in four words: Been there, done that.

Hideo Nomo will learn enough English to tell me where to stick it.

Somebody will stop blaming shifty-as-a-Fox Sports West 2 for making 40 Dodger games inaccessible, and start blaming the Dodgers for not realizing this might have happened.

The rest of us know better than to trust our cable guy.

The ninth inning of the Cleveland Indians’ early games will be shown on “Court TV.”

The Dodgers will realize, when they decided to pay big money to an Oriole third baseman, that they should have waited a couple of months.

An official scorer will be fired in a fantasy league scandal.

By the end of the season, not only will Jackie Robinson be forgotten again, but hardly anybody will notice the small number of African American players and fans.

Jim Abbott will stay retired when he realizes general managers only want him as a publicity stunt.

And if the Angels don’t bring back Abbott in some sort of Tom Lasorda-type role, they are sillier than that wacky manager of theirs.

Terry Collins, realizing the regular season is the time to get serious, will bench pinch-runner Bruce Hornsby for Charlie Sheen.

When celebrities throw out the first pitch in Anaheim, it’s the real first pitch. Next week against the Yankees, Derek Jeter will take some automotive account executive deep.

Lasorda’s managerial protege will lose 90 games and cause an entire city to demand his firing.

Then Bobby Valentine will get another job, just as he always does.

Raul Mondesi will be most valuable player. Not of the Dodgers. Of the National League.

Sometime around July, when Kenny Lofton has made a mess of the Braves and Dave Justice and Marquis Grissom have combined for 30 homers in Cleveland, somebody will remind Atlanta genius John Schuerholz of something: This is the 10-year anniversary of David Cone for Ed Hearn.

Somebody will recognize somebody on the Pittsburgh Pirates. Maybe not this month, but soon.

Nobody will recognize Delino DeShields, not because he is in St. Louis, but because he has decided to start showing up regularly for work.

For a second consecutive year, a Chicago White Sox player will engage in a fistfight with a fan underneath the stands.

This time it isn’t going to be Tony Phillips.

On Aug. 31, Mark McGwire, avoiding a brushback pitch, is going to belt a ball out of Coors Field with the back of his upper arm.

Every team that wins in Coors will say that the park is the same size for both teams.

Every team that loses there will say it’s not.

Few will realize that the Rockies’ ability to steal signs in their park has something to do with it.

Somebody will misspell Andruw Jones.

Nobody will misspell Chipper Jones.

Rafael Palmeiro will be the best player nobody knows.

Will Clark will be the worst player everybody knows.

The best left-handed starter on the Seattle Mariners will be Jeff Fassero.

The best right-handed reliever on the Dodgers will be Darren Dreifort.

Brady Anderson and Ellis Burks will return to earth . . .

. . . just as Marc Newfield and Ryan Klesko are leaving.

Somebody is going to finally ask Jim Leyland, if he’s the best manager in the history of the game, how come he couldn’t win a pennant with Barry Bonds, Bobby Bonilla and Doug Drabek?

Larry Dierker is going to discover that during 12-game losing streaks, there’s not much time to break for commercials.

Deion Sanders is going to ask to be traded to a team with which he can also pitch.

Steve Avery will discover that signing with an American League team when suffering from decreased velocity does not qualify one for Mensa.

Nothing will be written about the Minnesota Twins that will even remotely interest anyone not named Stahoviak.

Marlins, Cubs and Dodgers.

Blue Jays, Indians and Mariners.

Dodgers and Mariners.

Best hardball team in town is still the Bruins.