Mr. Cool wants panicking Dodgers fans to chill

Back in my Monte Vista High School (now deceased) days, we used to have this adorable little head cheerleader named Carol Occhipinti who would lead us in one of those repeat-after-me chants: “Be cool. Be calm. Be collected.”

I come to you today as Mr. Cool. Not the one who roamed the halls of MVHS, looking absolutely dashing in yellow corduroy bellbottoms, but one offered as someone who’s been around the baseball block a time or two. Please exhale.

The Dodgers are struggling at almost the exact moment they were presumed ready to lay claim to a third division title. Instead, they’ve lost four consecutive games. They’ve allowed the Giants to dream those crazy dreams Giants tend to dream.

And I say repeat after Carol: Be cool (be cool). Be calm (be calm). Be collected (be collected).

Now certainly the Dodgers are not playing well right now. They have absolutely been pushed around by the mediocre Diamondbacks the last two games. They have looked flat, which teams struggling to score always will, and in need of another “urgency” message.

Only, if you’re expecting Manager Don Mattingly to do a clubhouse berserko routine, you’ve come to the wrong place.

“You mean like scream and yell and turn over tables and stuff?” Mattingly said. “I’m not quite there yet. Our guys have been through this. We came home after Pittsburgh, the sky was falling, everything was going bad, we were all ready to panic. We put some wins together. We go into Houston and get swept. The sky is falling, we’re not going anywhere. And we right the ship.

“We’ve got a lot of character in that clubhouse, guys who care. There’s no need for me to go in there to yell and scream and pump these guys up. These guys have been through wars. We’re going to be fine.”

In early August, the Dodgers were swept in Pittsburgh, lost their next game in Washington and then came back to win five of their next six. Later that month, they were swept in a three-game series in Houston to leave them with their only five-game losing streak of the season, and then won eight of their next nine.

They are mostly a very veteran team, filled with players who have been through all the stretch-run drama. They are not going to panic because they are suddenly not playing particularly well.

Injured players have been coming and going for weeks now. The roster, and the lineup, needs a moment to find its footing.

Certainly, they need to dial up the aggressiveness, put together more consistent at-bats and rediscover their swagger. It will not hurt their cause that in the next two games they are starting Zack Greinke and Clayton Kershaw.

Yet they cannot relax and wait for the Giants to lose to bring home the division title.

“We need to win our way in,” Mattingly said.

They are still up six games with 12 to play. If that’s not exactly dire, neither should they assume things will magically work out. There is a palatable angst out there among the faithful that may be borne more out of the last two postseason failures than any real belief the Dodgers are headed for some serious collapse.

Now perhaps you’re struggling with me seemingly out of character in this guise of positivity, but remember, Carol Occhipinti taught me long ago that in these pressure situations, be cool. And absolutely wear yellow corduroy bellbottoms whenever possible.