Giving Andrew Friedman a second chance at the perfect Dodgers hire

Dear Andrew Friedman:

Let’s try this again. I provided this remarkable opportunity once before, but you went and hired Farhan Zaidi as your general manager, apparently because he scored a point higher on his IQ test.

That’s right, after you totally blew off my exciting offer to be your new general manager a year ago, here I am, ever so humbly, back to offer my services in the dugout. Steve Dilbeck, Dodgers manager. It just sounds so inevitable.

This might be the obvious move to the masses, but I fear you may still need convincing despite the incredible relationship we have developed since last October. I’m the bald, fat guy in the press box who wears too many Hawaiian shirts.

Allow me to reacquaint you with the facts:

+ Never in the long history of baseball has a sports writer been hired as a manager and failed. I mean, absolutely never.

+ This is what you said Thursday during your press conference to announce that you and Don Mattingly had some kind of organic problem and decided to mutually part ways:

“We encourage debate, we encourage disagreements, because if everyone is coming at it from the exact same perspective of, ‘All we want to do is win a world championship,’ then it allows for that healthy back and forth.”

Now who have you had more debates with than myself? Seems like a natural. You are really going to hire a Gabe Kapler and leave everyone convinced he’s your little yes-man? Never be a problem with me.

+ I’ve been giving you free advice for the past 12 months, so it’s time I received some real compensation. And you have to admit, sometimes I was even right. Sorry how that Zach Lee start turned out, but come on, he earned a shot.

+ I know the team. Been in that home clubhouse every game for the past six years. A couple players even know who I am.

+ You’ve revamped the front office, the minor league coaching staff, the scouts, the training staff, the stadium organist and the skunks in the visiting dugout. Now you can start on the beat guys!

Tell you what, hire me and even I’ll bring along Los Angeles Times beat writer Dylan Hernandez as my bench coach. Is this starting to sound irresistible or what?

+ I know my way around the manager’s office. Have covered managers Tommy Lasorda, Bill Russell, Glenn Hoffman, Davey Johnson, Jim Tracy, Grady Little, Joe Torre and Mattingly. Look who’s still standing.

+ I have a rich Dodgers history. Was sitting near the right-field foul pole for Game 3 of the 1963 World Series when Don Drysdale pitched a three-hit, 1-0 shutout against the Yankees and Joe Pepitone flew out to Ron Fairly at the wall for the final out. Most people don’t realize I had perfectly positioned him defensively with my screams from the 10^th row. I’m a natural.

+ I remain a cutting edge kind of guy. As anyone who frequents this blog can tell you, I eat analytics for breakfast.

Not only do I still write primarily for the Web, I use Twitter, star in the Dylan Hernandez Periscope productions, have a really smart phone and can do anything on the Internet my kids show me how to do.

Can we just end this whole “wide net” managerial search masquerade right now? Sometimes a guy just gets lucky. And you won’t even have to have a press conference to announce my hiring. I won’t talk to the media.

Sincerely,

Steve Dilbeck