Do-Nothing Dodgers Do Everything at Box Office

The Angels added big-time attractions in Vladimir Guerrero and Bartolo Colon this off-season, and on Saturday, the first day that fans could purchase single-game tickets, the team sold 58,828.

The Dodgers did nothing this off-season, and continue to do nothing, and on Saturday, the first day that fans could purchase single-game tickets, the team sold more than 87,000, and close to 100,000 when including package deals. “This will be our biggest year in memory,” ticket manager Billy Hunter told The Times.

The power of Dodger Dogs, I guess, or diehard dumb fans.

*

ASSOCIATED PRESS moved a story around the world about the Dodgers’ success in selling tickets, noting: “The first-day ticket sales were a boost for Los Angeles, which hasn’t made the playoffs since 1996 and made few moves over winter.” AP’s subtle way of saying it makes no sense.

The Angels are the feel-good story in baseball. They have a new owner who not only reduced beer prices, but paid big money to land players good enough to play for the Yankees.

The Dodgers have a really new owner, a Boston Red Sox lover who doesn’t always tell the truth and who has done almost nothing to boost the worst run-producing team in baseball from last season.

And yet this year, the fans couldn’t wait to buy Dodger tickets, purchasing twice as many as last year, and the year before.

Who knew Bubba Trammell would be such a draw?

*

DO THE media have it all wrong? Has Plaschke been too tough on the Dodgers? Why are the fans so hyped about this team? Juan Encarnacion?

Did the Boston parking lot attendant say something inspiring that I missed? Or, is it the lure of a Wilkin Ruan bobblehead doll?

One Dodger executive said he was concerned the media would show up Saturday to find an empty parking lot devoid of fans wishing to buy tickets, and the TV cameras would record it all. Instead it was a stampede.

Do the fans feel so sorry for the cash-strapped owner that this is their way of advancing him some money? Or, are they psychic -- seeing the return of Mike Piazza in the weeks to come as the right-handed power hitter this team so sorely needs?

The Dodgers are arguably weaker than last season, losing two of their best pitchers -- Kevin Brown and Paul Quantrill -- to the Yankees, and yet some fans were sleeping in their cars to be first in line for Dodger tickets. Some people buy hockey tickets. Now those are the people I would expect to find sleeping in cars.

Why would baseball fans want to reward Dodger ownership for assembling a weaker team? Do they really intend to use these tickets and sit through another boring season?

Come on, people, weren’t you embarrassed standing in line to buy Dodger tickets?

*

“PEOPLE WANT to see the Yankees,” said Derrick Hall, the Dodgers’ vice president for communications. “The Yankees have that kind of pull.”

Now that would explain it -- because I never for a moment thought folks would line up just to watch the Dodgers play.

But it does make sense that Dodger fans would want that once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to watch a baseball team that can hit, score runs and appears dedicated to winning at all costs. What a novelty.

For some of these people they’ve probably never seen such a thing.

In fact, 33,000 of the 87,000 single-game Dodger tickets sold Saturday were to just the Yankee series, and “I would imagine a number of people were turned away after the Yankee series was sold out,” Hall said, “so rather than leave with nothing, they bought tickets for other games with the Giants, or maybe for July 4th.”

It appears we’re getting closer and closer to that time when the Dodgers, like the Clippers have been doing for years, begin urging fans to buy tickets for the chance to watch some of the game’s greatest players -- none, of course, who play for the Dodgers.

*

TED BALL, the 61-year-old bus driver who underwent a double lung transplant less than two years ago, said he finished the Los Angeles Marathon in 6 hours 40 minutes.

“It certainly wasn’t any land-speed record,” he said. “I’m limping around today, but after I do some running for 15 or 20 minutes later today, it will be OK.”

Ball said that when he hit the finish line, “it was like, whoa -- you did it. But I was so beat there wasn’t much emotion. It was later on when it got to me.”

Ball, who has had trouble breathing all his life, underwent a double lung transplant in May 2002. When told what he had accomplished was amazing, he objected.

“I’ll tell you what was amazing,” he said. “That young man’s e-mail in the paper [Sunday].”

A medical student in Dublin (Ireland) e-mailed to say that a 26-year-old cystic fibrosis patient, who had rejected all overtures to have a heart/lung transplant, had changed his mind after hearing of Ball’s recovery.

“Now that’s amazing,” Ball said. “You know, my wife was born in Dublin, and we were talking about taking a trip there. I’d like to find that young man, and if I’m not intruding, talk with him about a few things.”

*

TODAY’S LAST word comes from Jason Tollner:

“Do you think it’s fair? Would you give the women a head start? Surely you have something to say about giving a woman such a break in the marathon and then listening to everyone make a big deal out of it when she wins.”

I asked the wife what she thought, and she said as far as she was concerned, I could start without her.

*

T.J. Simers can be reached at t.j.simers@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Simers, go to latimes.com/simers.