Column: Dodgers go from Down Under to up-and-down to the top

The playoff chase began in late March, 7,500 miles from home, on a cricket ground masquerading as a baseball diamond, in a country that really didn’t care, with a team whose sanity was quickly pushed to the brink.

Star pitcher Clayton Kershaw’s first start led to a back injury that would sideline him for more than a month. Mercurial outfielder Yasiel Puig’s first two baserunning blunders led to a public rebuke from his manager and private anger from his teammates. The Dodgers returned home from Australia with their heads ducked down under.

“I guess you could say when this thing started, it wasn’t that much fun,” Manager Don Mattingly said with a wince.

Six months later, on a Wednesday night in front of 53,387 cheering and chanting fans in Chavez Ravine, the playoff chase ended, and the Dodgers’ world had turned. Kershaw beat the San Francisco Giants with his arm, glove and bat in finishing off one of the best seasons for a pitcher in baseball history. Puig hit a booming home run, then made a breathtaking throw.

The Dodgers clinched their second consecutive National League West title and headed for the playoffs with a chance to return to the World Series for the first time in 26 years.

“It sure ended up OK,” Mattingly said.

For now. This moment. But who knows? The disparity between their start and finish was a perfect metaphor for the Dodgers’ 2014 regular season.

“It’s been a real roller coaster around this place,” said outfielder Carl Crawford, wiping the sting of champagne from his eyes during the team’s postgame title celebration. “Every day, something new. Every day up, then down, then up again.”

They created some of the most memorable moments in franchise history, with two no-hitters, Kershaw’s 41 consecutive scoreless innings and the constant travails of the irrepressible Puig. Except fans in 70% of Southland homes saw very little of it, as they were held hostage by the Dodgers’ new $8.35-billion television deal with Time Warner Cable, which had difficulty selling the package to pay-TV operators.

The Dodgers drew the biggest single-game crowd in major league baseball this season — 53,500 on Monday against the Giants — while attracting nearly 4 million fans and leading the league in attendance by a wide margin. Yet their faithful were once again subject to parking lot nightmares, concession stand marathons, and such logistical madness that Times reporter Everett Cook wrote about how a two-mile trip to Dodger Stadium for a Thursday evening game in July took 90 minutes.

Like Crawford said, every day up, then down, then up again.

The Dodgers have four outfielders who could be starters. At least one of them was always mad about being benched, at least one was hurt, nobody was ever happy, and Matt Kemp’s agent even publicly implied that his client should be traded. The clubhouse was in constant outfielder uproar until finally, on July 25 in San Francisco, Mattingly settled on three — Crawford in left field, Puig in center, Kemp in right.

Puig hit three triples that night to lead the Dodgers to a victory that led to a three-game sweep that vaulted them over the Giants into first place for good.

“I had to pull the plug on rotating guys. I had to finally do something to make us steady, and it took me a while to get there,” Mattingly said. “But once I finally did, everything came into place.”

The infield was supposed to be another strength, and one of its young stars was supposed to be second baseman Alex Guerrero; like Puig, a highly touted defector from Cuba. But after being sent to the minor leagues early in the season, Guerrero was involved in a dugout fight during which catcher Miguel Olivo bit off a piece of his ear.

What, the Dodgers worry? Dee Gordon manned second base and became a surprise summer hit, a leadoff hitter and offensive catalyst who will lead the league in stolen bases.

“There’s been a lot of turmoil this year, a lot of things happen that have just been tedious, but that’s our job,” Mattingly said. “I’m not saying it’s bad, we just have a lot of personalities in there. But we’ve dealt with it.”

Besides Kershaw, the pitching rotation was blessed with a surprise standout in 34-year-old Josh Beckett. But that also didn’t last. On May 25 in Philadelphia, Beckett became the first Dodger to throw a no-hitter in 18 years, yet he won only three more games and is now mulling retirement after suffering a hip injury that prematurely ended his season.

Then there’s the bullpen, which has three former All-Star closers who struggled while providing a bridge between the starting pitchers and hard-throwing Kenley Jansen.

This is not a particularly close team. Last week, Kemp and Puig were shouting at each other in the dugout. Wednesday night, the traditional on-field, clinching group hug didn’t begin until Kershaw ran from the dugout and pulled everyone together.

This is not an emotionally consistent team. A day before his Wednesday night heroics, Puig nearly started a brawl by sitting at home plate and pouting after being hit in the foot by a pitch.

This is not a constantly focused team. Hanley Ramirez, the oft-injured shortstop whose past greatness has thus far been swallowed up in contract worries, apologized to Kershaw during Wednesday’s game for not a properly fielding a routine grounder.

“I understand people think we have problems,” Crawford said. “But in the end, we’ve all come together, and who knows what can happen now?”

Who knows, indeed? From Adrian Gonzalez batting third to Andre Ethier batting in the ninth inning, this is a talented, veteran team that should be able to make the adjustments from last year’s run that ended just two games short of the World Series.

And, of course, this is a team led by Kershaw 2014, who is looking a lot like Orel Hershiser 1988, and you know what happened then — the Dodgers were champions.

“We were built to win a World Series, not to just make it to the playoffs, and that’s what we’re trying to do,” Kershaw said during Wednesday’s celebration. “We know what it’s like to fail, and we don’t want that feeling again.”

For a better or worse, this is a Hollywood team. And, yeah, this up-down-up ride is probably just beginning.

bill.plaschke@latimes.com

Twitter: @billplaschke