Answers to Dodgers’ selection of Zach Lee with No.1 pick about to be answered

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Tick, tock, my but that clock is getting loud. The alarm goes off soon.

Do you know where your No.1 draft pick is?

Of course you do, on the football field at LSU throwing spirals, and not getting ready to play rookie ball.

Is this really how this plays out? Zach Lee, third-string LSU quarterback? Wasted No.1 pick by the Dodgers?

We find out Monday. By 9 p.m. either Lee has signed on to join the Boys in Blue or the Dodgers have lost the pick.

Dodgers head scouting honcho Logan White has promised the Dodgers will make a substantial offer to the 6-4 right-hander. Still, going into the weekend, apparently no offer, and no contact since draft day.

The Dodgers picked Lee with the 28th pick. He was universally considered a higher selection, but other teams steered clear convinced he was set to honor his commitment to LSU.

A 28th pick is generally slotted to earn $1.2 million, though Lee’s family let it be known it would take a much higher signing bonus to keep him out of LSU.

The Dodgers knew this and White has maintained all along the Dodgers will come up with a substantial offer. Apparently at the last minute. Kinda keeps the negotiating down to a minimum.

Kevin Baxter examines in the Times’ Sunday baseball column whether the Dodgers are being prudent or just cheap in their selecting of a player many felt couldn’t be signed.

That would be over a million saved, and no team has spent less on its draft picks the past two years.

Meanwhile, Yahoo.com’s Steve Henson believes the Dodgers will make a tempting offer. And if Lee spurs the offer, Henson points out the Dodgers would get a compensation pick next year in the same spot, so it’s not a total loss. By then, hopefully, the divorce mess is over and the Dodgers will have a better feel for where they are financially.

Only one of the top seven picks has signed, so this down to the wire stuff is fairly routine.

The Dodgers are making it interesting, though. Either they sign Lee and everyone applauds how darn crafty they were, or they lose him to LSU and everyone starts up again with the McCheap routine.

We’ll know soon. Tick, tock …

Meanwhile, there is some other good Dodgers reading in Sunday’s Times:

-- Times columnist T.J. Simers nails the Manny Ramirez saga, chronicling how he had it all with the Dodgers and ``although he did such a great job rehabilitating his reputation upon arriving here, he seems to have dedicated himself now to reminding everyone in baseball he really can’t be counted on.’’

Simers also pays a nice tribute to now ex-Dodger Garret Anderson and blasts Matt Kemp‘s agent, Dave Stewart, for whining to the press.

-- Bill Shaikin has another of his outstanding pieces on the strange doings of team ownership that are coming forward out of the divorce. This one has the team renting Dodger Stadium from itself $14 million. I can’t explain it, either. But then, the McCourts didn’t pay income taxes for six years.

-- Steve Dilbeck