One Way or Another, He Has a Trip to Make

The wife gets Columbus Day off, and so she asked if I’d take Monday off too, spend the day with her and maybe go shopping.

I’m not sure a person can have much more fun that, but if the Dodgers were to make it a five-game series against the Cardinals, the newspaper has scheduled me to go to St. Louis on Monday.

Obviously, you know how I want things to play out today.

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THEY SHOWED Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger sitting in the Dodger Stadium stands, which was kind of appropriate, because what’s more improbable than an Austrian body-building champ turned Terminator who goes on to become the governor of California? For starters, I’d say Jose Lima, a.k.a. the Miracle Man, who was pitching for the Newark Bears last season, throwing a shutout for the Dodgers against the powerful Cardinals, who had the chance to clinch.

The only thing that could top that would be Jason Grabowski getting a pinch-hit home run to send the Dodgers to the World Series. At this point, I do not rule it out.

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NONE OF this makes sense. Shawn Green hit back-to-back home runs in Game 3; at times this season some people would have been satisfied if he had just gone back-to-back months hitting home runs.

Major League Baseball paid six umpires to officiate the game and not one of them spotted Lima’s bunt hitting his bat a second time, which would have been an out or a foul ball depending on whether he had left the batter’s box. The Dodgers eventually turned that into a two-run lead.

“It never hit me or my bat,” Lima said, and because his feet never touched the ground all night long, I’m not surprised he didn’t feel it.

If this were the NBA, the conspiracy experts would have you believing a plan has been set in motion by the umps to match the West Coast against the Yankees or Red Sox in the World Series.

I don’t know how the Dodgers make it to the World Series if there isn’t such a plan because I’ve watched them all season. They aren’t good enough to make it to the World Series, but for some reason they haven’t gotten the message yet.

How do you explain the Dodgers going at least one game deeper into the playoffs than the “A Team”? (Well, for one thing, the Micro Manager probably wouldn’t have called on Jarrod Washburn with Troy Percival still standing unused in the bullpen.)

“I don’t know how this team finds a way,” admitted the Miracle Man, or the “Miracle Guy,” as he said, while pounding a playful fist into my chest. “We just got to believe. Just believe. Don’t give up on us.”

Hey, I’m scheduled to spend the day with the wife and go shopping Monday; no way I’m going to give up on the Dodgers at this point.

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THE GREAT Dodger organization won its first postseason game since 1988, ruining one of the great unbelievable statistics in sports history, and amazingly none of the players seemed upset by what that does to local columnists. (Do you know how tough it’s going to be to write about the Dodgers down the road without that stat?)

“We were down 0-2, but then we seem to be more successful when our backs are against the wall,” Green said, and I have no idea what wall he’s talking about, but it’s amazing to me it took them 16 years before they figured out all they had to do was line their guys up against the wall to get better results.

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I’M GUESSING that Lima got more face time on Fox’s broadcast than Homer Simpson gets on his own show.

“I thought I was going to have a heart attack when the fans started chanting ‘Lima, Lima,’ ” he said, and it would have been interesting to see 24 teammates, the Micro Manager and pitching coach running on to the field to give him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to keep the team’s hopes alive.

Speaking of “Alive,” that’s what catcher David Ross had written across the front of his T-shirt when the Dodgers returned from St. Louis on Friday. I’d say it was a big hit with everyone, but no one would believe me if I said Ross was the one who delivered it.

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SOMEONE ASKED the Micro Manager after the game, “What kind of leash will Odalis Perez be on [tonight]?” I swear it wasn’t me.

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THE DODGERS didn’t spare any expense when it came to bringing in people to throw out the first ceremonial first pitch. They called on Tom Lasorda, broadcasters Rick Monday and Fernando Valenzuela -- all three of whom would have been here anyway -- and also included Ron Cey, who is in the running to join the Dodgers’ broadcasting team. The quartet was representing the 1981 Dodger champions.

They could have invited Mike Scioscia too. He was available.

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THIS WAS the first playoff game at Dodger Stadium in eight years, and the Dodgers needed all the energy and enthusiasm they could muster against the mighty Cardinals. The fans responded in force when the Dodgers were introduced, ending with a roar for Lima, and then management brought out Kevin Eubanks, the musical director from “The Tonight Show,” to play the national anthem, sapping all the energy in the place.

Eubanks played the guitar, offering a plodding version that suggested he had just learned it an hour before the game.

The same people who tried to burst the eardrums of paying customers all season long with piped-in noise suddenly opted to go mellow at a time when they should have presented the most powerful, uplifting voice they could find in Hollywood.

I know who should sing the national anthem tonight: Lima.

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