Et Tu, Dodgers?

Walter Alston, Dodger manager for 23 years. Tommy Lasorda, Dodger manager for 20 years. Bill Russell, Dodger manager for 22 months--one full season and parts of two others. A bit of Dodger pride, Dodger tradition, bit the dust with Sunday’s firing of Russell.

This is the Fox media conglomerate’s rookie year as Dodger owner. Throughout baseball, family stewardships like that of the Dodgers’ O’Malleys have yielded to ownership by corporations and wealthy partnerships. It costs hundreds of millions of dollars to buy a baseball team, tens of millions of dollars to pay the salaries each year. Owners want quick returns on their investments. In large part, patience has been thrown out of the game.

From their days as the beloved “bums” of Brooklyn, the Dodgers have extended their appeal beyond their hometown, one of the few professional sports franchises with a nationwide following among fans who have seldom or never seen the team play in person. If your home team wasn’t winning, you could always root for the Dodgers. Part of the mystique has been not firing managers. Alston resigned, and so did Lasorda, both at the end of great runs.

Throwing a manager overboard in midseason often is intended to give fans the impression the team is serious about winning this year. But firing the manager is also often shortsighted. He’s not the one bobbling the ball or striking out. Better players and a contending team bring fans through the turnstiles.

The team has dirtied its uniform, in the wrong way. Russell could have been allowed to finish the year. After all, he cannot be seen as the sole scapegoat for the Dodgers’ failure to reach the World Series since 1988, 10 long years.

The Dodgers of course aren’t the only Southern California baseball team to have come under a corporate flag in the 1990s. Down the freeway in Anaheim, the Angels went from Gene Autry’s sole ownership two years ago to being one-fourth owned and entirely operated by the Disney conglomerate. That’s show biz.