Dodgers get a script doctor

Our first instinct was to ban the usual Hollywood cliche. You know: The Dodgers’ season has been so wacky that even a Hollywood screenwriter could not have dreamed this up.

But we figured we’d better run that by a Hollywood screenwriter first. So we dropped by the Paramount Pictures lot the other day, to check with Scott Kaufer.

Kaufer has no shortage of credits as a producer and writer for such shows as “Boston Legal,” “Murphy Brown,” “The Chris Isaak Show” and “Arliss,” but he’d rather talk baseball. His cozy office is crammed with baseball memorabilia from floor to ceiling, decorated in vintage Don Drysdale and Maury Wills, accented by portraits of Dodger Stadium and L.A.’s old Wrigley Field.

So let’s talk baseball. Is this Dodgers season straight out of a Hollywood script?

“That’s what Vin Scully always says -- the Kirk Gibson home run, those back-to-back-to-back-to-back shots in ’06 -- that it’s the stuff of Hollywood screenwriters,” Kaufer said. “But I think Vinny is talking movies -- Robert Redford as Roy Hobbs -- that singular, dramatic moment.

“This Dodgers season isn’t so much a movie as a TV show.”

How so?

“It was more episodic, fits and starts,” he said. “Up became down, down became up, like the story was meant to play out in 22 episodes.”

The new season -- that’s what they say in TV, too -- started as soon as the old one ended. The Dodgers ditched Grady Little as fast as they could say “Joe Torre,” introducing the new manager in a widely televised and highly choreographed news conference, then plastering his picture on billboards around town.

Star power, baby.

“Stunt casting,” Kaufer said. “It’s the oldest TV trick in the book. If the show’s not working, you bring in a new face.”

That was the season premiere, but then came the season. Frank McCourt and Ned Colletti sat in the same room at Dodger Stadium last winter, selling Andruw Jones on the Dodgers.

Then came all the strikeouts, and the calculator: $47 million for Jason Schmidt, $44 million for Juan Pierre, $36 million for Jones. McCourt, the owner, took away Colletti’s credit card and wouldn’t say whether Colletti would be cast as general manager next season.

So Colletti shopped at Goodwill. Angel Berroa, for free. Casey Blake, for free. Manny Ramirez, for free. Greg Maddux, for $500,000.

For McCourt and Colletti, the mutual goodwill is back.

“They’re the heart of this buddy comedy,” Kaufer said. “You’re always looking for people who are better together than they are apart. Along the way, they’ll drive each other crazy and almost kill each other, but they’re always fun to watch.”

The pratfalls of the Dodgers were countered by the pratfalls of their foils, the Arizona Diamondbacks. The Dodgers seemingly auditioned a new shortstop each week, with guest stars from Hu to Who?

And, Kaufer said, the Dodgers had their “jump-the-shark” player, the television term for that moment when ridiculous crosses the line to completely unbelievable.

“The catcher who couldn’t throw the ball back to the pitcher,” Kaufer said.

The Dodgers discovered a breakout star in center field. They told us for two years that Matt Kemp could not play center, so they signed Pierre to play there, and then Jones.

Yet Jones, the five-time All-Star who left his bat in Atlanta, became a supporting actor, with Kemp as the electrifying force at bat, on the bases and with the postgame victory bump in center field.

“He’s the Fonz,” Kaufer said. “When ‘Happy Days’ started, Ron Howard was going to be the star. They found out people were tuning in to see Henry Winkler, so they rewrote the show to be a starring vehicle for the Fonz.”

And, just as Winkler turned black leather jackets into a must-have fashion item for young men, Ramirez turned dreadlocks into a must-have accessory for Dodgers fans.

“Manny Being Manny” is the perfect name for a situation comedy, and Ramirez compelled fans to tune in, to see what antics he might be up to next.

He enlivened the clubhouse -- and the lineup. Jeff Kent, in the role of curmudgeon, challenged the assertion that Ramirez’s presence in the lineup helped his productivity, then challenged the beloved Scully for repeating that assertion. Now Kent is recovering from knee surgery, out of the lineup and out of a starring role.

“He gets his script every week and flips through it,” Kaufer said, “and he doesn’t see any lines for himself.”

Ramirez hit .400. He hit home runs. The Dodgers suddenly had a hit on their hands, a revitalized show, perhaps an extended run.

“He can be the transformational actor that gives you another season or two,” Kaufer said.

Colletti thanks Ramirez for that.

We asked Kaufer to script an ending for this season. He envisions a dramatic circle, with the Dodgers facing the Boston Red Sox in the same place the teams played in March -- at the Coliseum, after city officials uncover seismic deficiencies at Dodger Stadium and force McCourt to find an alternate location for the World Series.

“If McCourt can get 137,682 people in there, you don’t think he’d play there?” Kaufer said.

We’ll take it from there. The World Series returns to Boston, and Game 7 extends into extra innings. With two out in the 13th, J.D. Drew drops a fly ball, just as he dropped the Dodgers.

That brings up Ramirez, who hits a towering home run, over the Green Monster, knocking out the lights in the Citgo sign in Kenmore Square. As he circles the bases, he blows kisses to the jeering Boston fans.

Jonathan Broxton gets the save, and the Dodgers rush to mob him on the mound -- all but Ramirez, who ducks into the Green Monster, then emerges with a Sharpie and a few sheets of paper.

He runs straight to McCourt.

“It’s my new contract,” Ramirez tells him. “Sign here.”

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bill.shaikin@latimes.com