"Daddy, Why Won't the Bad Man Go Away?"

Well, son, because he's bad. And bad people don't know when to go away. They're mean and greedy and selfish and they stay as long as they can, no matter how much they're not wanted, no matter how much they're hated, no matter how many millions of people want them to leave. The only thing we can hope for is that good prevails over evil and a hero emerges.

Eventually, in spite of all his tactics and attorneys, in spite of all the legal types who think McCourt may wind up hanging onto to the team through his latest strategy - the bankruptcy filing - don't believe for a minute that Frank McCourt will continue to be the owner of the Dodgers much longer. May take a little more time than I initially predicted once the Commish assigned a trustee to oversee operations of the club in April, but it will happen. Maybe he'll get to keep the parking lot for awhile, but sooner or later, Frank McCourt will be ousted as the owner of the Dodgers and the team and it's fans will finally be free. Long live Bud Selig for his attempts to restore our beloved Blue to the fans. I want a Dodger Dog. Maybe one day soon when he's long gone.

The team? Sorry hopefuls and wishfuls. Those 25 hits and 15 runs against the Siblings Who Were Born At The Same Time And Look Exactly Alike were nothing more than a history-making aberration. A fluke. A mirage. An oasis in a hot, dry, endless Sahara. I was wrong in my earlier blog. This team DOES stink. Matt Kemp is great. MVP material for sure. Andre Ethier is very good, but his pop has left the ballpark. Kershaw, as it turns out, is finally looking like the real deal. I like what I'm seeing from The Thin Man and who doesn't like Mattingly's "Mighty Mites," Carroll and Miles? That's it. Six very good players. Even though Loney is coming out of his funk, the rest of the team is mediocre to lousy. (Though I'm curious to see what Tony Gwynn can do if he plays every day and what Kuroda could do if his team had an offense.) But, they just can't put it together for any length of time and, in spite of the general weakness of the division, they won't. Their pitching actually sucks from the starting rotation through the bullpen. Kemp can't do it all by himself and Kershaw can't pitch every day. Gordon is still too young to have the responsibility of the team's fortunes heaped on his rather unsubstantial shoulders and Ethier is just a singles hitter now. Thames stinks. Totally clueless. Loney is weak. Uribe and Blake are engaged in a stinking contest. Uribe is winning. They have no catcher. Billingsley is extremely inconsistent, usually bad. Lilly is having a terrible year. De La Rosa isn't the answer, at least not yet. (He pitched great today) Their awful bullpen rests on the young arms of Javvy Guerra and Kenley Jansen. Mattingly looks in over his head. They're just terrible.

Barring a miracle, I expect them to be sellers instead of buyers before the deadline and that could mean we could be saying good-bye to some of the bigger contracts. Kuroda, maybe Billingsley, maybe Loney, and hopefully, Uribe and Thames. I don't know if anyone would want Blake, but you never know. However, we want to root for them because of the predicament they're in. These Dodgers are the product of greed. What? Isn't that moniker reserved for the Yankees and Red Sox? No. In fact, it's more apt when used to reference the Dodgers. They're the product of McCourt's greed and avarice. Had he actually cared about the team and spent money to improve them, the Dodgers would have a pretty good shot at the division. Fans would come to the ballpark. It would be a completely different summer. Why does McCourt not seem to realize that Selig turning down the Fox deal is NOT the reason he and the Dodgers are in this position. It's his greed, mismanagement and overall eely slipperiness. It's that he's a horrible jackass and everybody truly despises him. This is indeed why Selig and every Dodger fan in LA wants him gone. Now. Please. What would Albert Pujols look like in a Dodger uniform? We'll probably never find out. By the time this is all resolved, the Dodgers may be taking a shot at signing Mike Moustakis in his first year of free agency. ... in 2018. Here's hoping it happens much, much sooner.