Bill Plaschke Doesn't Believe in Costs

So it's like 1 AM, and I decided to read some Bill Plaschke. Why? I'm a masochist. And not just any masochist, a masochist whose particular form of masochism involves reading incomprehensible, one-line paragraph riddled articles with overly flowery prose that makes my head hurt.

So it wasn't exactly a free turkey.

To enjoy it, you had to buy a newspaper or own a computer.

Looks like a food metaphor!

But as Thanksgiving gifts go, this season the Dodgers owners were downright philanthropic.

On Tuesday afternoon, Jamie McCourt gave every fan something so awkward and ill-conceived, it bobbed its head and gobbled.

Smells like a food metaphor!

The turkey was dressed in quote marks and stuffed with outrageousness. While Dodgers fans will certainly have fun chewing on it, they will never, ever swallow.

Sweet Jeebus, it is a food metaphor.

Plaschke summarizes an interview Jamie McCourt gave where he states that she wondered whether fans would rather have 50 youth baseball fields or a high priced free agent. Meanwhile, the caption on a picture at the top of the page quotes McCourt as saying "Building a team and helping the city is not an either-or thing. We want to do both."

Plaschke has apparently been taking writing lessons from me, evidenced by this sentence:

No, No, No, No.

Change the three commas to periods and you're set!

No, fans should never be forced to choose between a charity and a championship, that's absurd, is this a baseball team or a telethon? The fans want their money to go to one field only, the one occupied by the Dodgers, anything else is unethical and even immoral.

Ahem. Mr. Plaschke, the caption on the photo at the top of your page clearly states that McCourt says that they want to *both* build a team and help the community.

The "unethical and immoral" thing bugs me too. Is it unethical for a team to give money to charity? Is it immoral? It's far more unethical to pay a guy 200 million dollars to hit a ball with a stick when that money could be going to far less privileged people. At least that's my view.

Yes, these quotes now place the Dodgers in an even more impossibly hotter and tighter spot this winter.

If they spend the right money and make the smart moves, fine, everyone will forget about these Horn O'Ugly quotes.

If they don't, fans will remember nothing else.

Impossibly hotter and tighter? Really?

Also, what person with a soul would actually say "Damn it, the Dodgers suck! If only they hadn't given those poor kids fields to play on and had signed A.J. Burnett instead! Damn poor kids, ruining my Dodgers! We should burn them all!"

I'd like to think that such a person would not be Bill Plaschke.

Did you see my Plaschke-esque one-line paragraph up there?

I thought that was pretty clever.

When I called the Dodgers' president for an explanation, she brightly responded with, "Happy Thanksgiving!"

I told her if she really believed her quotes, Dodgers fans wouldn't be having one.

Of course. Thanksgiving isn't about giving thanks, it isn't about spending time with friends and family, it isn't even about turkey. It's about whether or not one's baseball team spends money on "prize" free agents as opposed to baseball fields for underprivileged children. Thank you, Bill Plaschke.

"I always forget how a nice conversation can be so misconstrued," she said.

OK, so clarify.

Do you really expect Dodgers fans to accept a lesser team for the greater community good?

"Of course not," she said. "Building a team and helping the city is not an either-or thing. We want to do both."

Then why did you say it?

"It was a philosophical discussion, not a literal decision-making process," she said.

So, philosophically, you think it's wiser to invest in charity than championships? If you really believe this, should you even be owning a baseball team?

Where did this come from? If you look back at McCourt's quote, she said: "Whatever money they are guaranteed could be money that we could otherwise have given to the community." Which is true. And I don't see where it says that McCourt will not spend money on free agents, just that she feels a little guilty about it because she could instead be giving money to those who need it more.

[T]hey will not understand... if the Dodgers use that... as an excuse to not spend the money needed for this team to improve.

"We would never do that, that's just silly," McCourt said. "We are going to do whatever it takes to win, that's our No. 1 mission, whatever it takes to get a world championship."

Then why did you even imply otherwise?

"In these tough times, with so many people losing their jobs, isn't it fair, philosophically, to at least ask about the dollars?" she said.

Oh. There it is. That's the reason for the quotes. That's the thinking behind the nonsense.

Here's the entire article summarized for those too lazy to read: Jamie McCourt says that she feels a little guilty giving free agents gigantic contracts when there are kids who can't play baseball on real fields and she could be giving them money. She wonders whether the fans would rather have a big-name free agent or 50 youth baseball fields. Plaschke is outraged that anyone would choose anything other than the big-name free agent, assumes that McCourt will refuse to spend money on free agents despite her constant assertions otherwise, and questions McCourt's ability to own a baseball team.

You tell me: which side is nonsense?

In all her statements Tuesday, Jamie McCourt was dropping a line, testing the waters, fishing.

She wanted to see if fans would view the Dodgers off-season dilemma -- many holes, much money to fill them -- through the prism of this country's tough economic situation.

She wanted to see if fans, understanding their own obscenely tough times, would forgive the Dodgers for not emptying their wallets for players asking for obscenely large money.

She used charity as her bait, but her desired catch was something much bigger.

She wanted to know, will Dodgers fans judge their off-season performance by connecting the real world to the baseball world?

The answer is, again, no, no, no, no.

Where are you getting this? McCourt has never said she will not spend money. McCourt has only said she is not sure whether it's right to spend money on major free agents when it could be spent improving the community. I don't understand where you're making the assumption that anything McCourt has said has anything to do with the current economic crisis. Will you explain this ridiculous stretch in reasoning?

The reason fans will not forgive their lack of spending is the reason those fans spend money in the first place.

I didn't think so.

Again, there is no "lack of spending" going on here. McCourt simply philosophized on a potential reappropriation of funds. NOT HOLDING BACK ON SPENDING BECAUSE SHE DOESN'T HAVE ENOUGH MONEY.

Sports is not a reality show, it's a fantasy world. The Dodgers are not a business, they're an escape.

False. The Dodgers are entirely a business. They are an escape for fans, but fans pay money for the product of the business. The product is an escape. The Dodgers are a business. And sports are definitely real. Maybe they were "a fantasy world" (weird plural/non-plural situation Plaschke's fault) in the 50's or 60's, but with the dawn of free agency, they are very real, and living in the real world. Baseball teams are as affected by economic crises as the rest of the world.

Fans don't want to hear millionaire owners complaining about costs, they want to watch baseball players winning games.

Fans are paying big money to believe that the cost doesn't matter. Fans are devoting long hours to believe that success can happen overnight.

Sorry, there are costs associated with baseball. Just because you don't want to hear about them doesn't make them go away.

And something about that last sentence is really funny. Like the image of a guy sitting up late at night at his desk forcing himself to believe that in the morning the Dodgers will be good.

If Babe Ruth could thrive in the Great Depression, then the Dodgers can field a championship team in 2009, no economic excuses accepted.

This is one of the most bizarre mixed comparisons I've seen in a while. Babe Ruth was a player, not a team. He was not responsible for the financial aspects of running a team. And if you want to use a team as an example, the A's were the dominant team in the AL at the end of the 20's and into the 30's, but they ran into financial trouble and had to sell off their best players. The Cardinals were a dominant team in the NL, but they only survived because they had one of the best GMs in history, Branch Rickey, who was notorious for penny-pinching and trading away overpaid veterans in favor of young players. In essence, doing the opposite of what Plaschke wants the Dodgers to do.

Also, when has McCourt even hinted that she would even actually consider not spending money on the Dodgers?

The McCourts have spent loads of money on building this team, and should be judged only on whether they will continue to spend it.

Plaschke is apparently totally unaware that Jamie McCourt told him that she had no intentions of reappropriating funds away from the Dodgers.

And, yes, they can even wish us all a Happy Thanksgiving.

Just, please, no more turkeys.

And back to the food metaphor. With two Plaschke's Patented One-Line Paragraphs™.