Dodgers announce 2012 spring training broadcast schedule [Updated]

Now that the silly, lip-synced, concussion-induced, look-at-me professional sport that doesn’t even play in Los Angeles is finally over, we can move on to the world’s greatest game?

Get those big-screen LEDs and plasmas fired up — pitchers and catchers report to Camelback Ranch in Arizona in just two weeks, and on Tuesday, the Dodgers released their spring training broadcast schedule.

Counting their three Freeway Series games against the Angels, the Dodgers will televise 18 spring training games.

The only sigh-inducing element is that Vin Scully will not broadcast any games from Camelback, so he won’t be heard from until April 3 when the Dodgers and Angels meet at Dodger Stadium. Maybe we should have sent him some cookies.

[Updated at 11:35 a.m., Feb. 7: Here's some good news. In a new announcement, the Dodgers said Scully will now broadcast a pair of games from Camelback on March 17 against the Giants and March 18 vs. the Angels.]

There are 13 games scheduled to be carried by Prime Ticket, three on KCAL Channel 9 and two on Fox Sports West. The Dodgers’ new flagship radio station, KLAC-AM (570), will air nine games and Spanish-language station KTNQ-AM (1020) will carry eight.

Once again you won’t see or hear it all, of course. On nine different game days, the Dodgers will be on neither English-speaking TV nor radio.

Scully aside, the Dodgers’ regular-season announcing duos of Charley Steiner and Rick Monday, and Eric Collins and Steve Lyons, will announce the spring broadcasts. Jaime Jarrin and Pepe Yniguez will broadcast the Spanish-language games, with Fernando Valenzeula joining for three games.

The spring opener March 5 against the White Sox will be on radio only. The first televised game is the following day on Prime Ticket with Steiner and Monday.

The complete spring broadcasting schedule can be found here.

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The Dodger who can have the greatest effect on the 2012 season

— Steve Dilbeck

Dodgers web musings: It's the daily question

The off-season for the Dodgers used to be spent wondering if the new pieces would fit, if they’d be any good, if they had a shot at the World Series.

That would normally be the first question asked by acquaintances, or those I was just meeting who discovered what I did for a living:

How are the Dodgers going to be this year?

Only, not this off-season. This winter it is seldom asked. Now the first question is always:

Who’s going to be the new Dodgers owner?

Like I had some remarkable insight into the curious cranium of Frank McCourt. I usually just reply, "The guy who bids the most." Not trying to be flip, it’s just that those of us follow the Dodgers professionally have no double-secret knowledge of what is really happening behind the scenes that we’re failing to share with the public.

Which doesn’t mean we don’t like to speculate as much as the next guy. Will it be all money for McCourt? If bids are close, does a guy with L.A. roots win out, the guy with a baseball background, the guy who took McCourt to lunch?

Jon Heyman, the veteran baseball writer now at CBS Sports, likes the chances of the Magic Johnson/Stan Kasten combo, particularly if local billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong joins their group.

Heyman  said he heard the bidding is already up to $1.5-billion range, which is certainly believable since Larry King, who was in the Dennis Gilbert group that didn’t make the first cut, told ESPN’s Jim Bowden they bid $1.25 billion.

The Times’ Bill Shaikin reported that at least eight groups advanced into the next round. They’re all stupid rich, and still waiting in the wings are billionaires Soon-Shiong and Ron Burkle, who are still expected to join someone’s group. Or some groups may yet merge, or bring in a group that didn’t make the first cut.

Really, I would tell you exactly what’s going to happen, if I or anyone else, actually knew.

Dodgers Web musings: Don Mattingly doubts big bat is coming

Say this for Don Mattingly: He usually does not try to snow you. He might, understandably, favor the company line, but he is a straight shooter.

That was on display again this week during a radio interview with 710 AM's "Mason and Ireland," when Mattingly first stated the obvious -– that the Dodgers most need an impact bat -- but then acknowledged he was not counting on that happening.

"I can't say I'm confident that we're going to be able to do it," he said. "We've talked about different things. ... You hear Prince [Fielder], you hear Albert [Pujols]. Those are nice thoughts; there's a lot of teams talking about those type of guys ... but you got to have a Plan B, a Plan C. How do we put offense together if we can't do something like that? That's the biggest thing.

"And obviously, I don't know where we're going to be as far as what we're going to be able to do. Are we going to go backward with the budget, are we going to go forward? ... It's hard to know right now."

Got that right. Hard to know the budget when you can’t be sure who will own the team come next spring.

The kid is all right, the Dodgers aren't in 3-1 loss to Brewers

The kid -- the Dodgers' newest kid -- did almost everything right. For five innings, Nathan Eovaldi held the hottest team in baseball scoreless. Held them to three hits.

But with former Cy Young Award winner Zack Greinke matching him on the other end, 21-year-old Eovaldi finally cracked in the sixth. And with the way the season is unfolding for the Dodgers and the Brewers, that was enough.

Milwaukee used a two-run single by Jerry Hairston to spark a 3-1 victory over the Dodgers on Wednesday in Milwaukee, giving the Brewers their 19th win in their last 21 games. Some live volcanoes aren't that hot.

The Dodgers could not have asked more of Eovaldi, the baby-faced right-hander who was making his third major league start after being called up from double-A Chattanooga to replace another wunderkind, injured Rubby De La Rosa.

Supported by two double plays nicely turned by yet another rookie, Justin Sellers, Eovaldi matched Greinke through five highly efficient innings.

But two one-out walks wrapped around a single by Prince Fielder loaded the bases in the sixth. Pitching coach Rick Honeycutt visited the mound, but Manager Don Mattingly elected to let Eovaldi try to pitch out of the jam.

Eovaldi got Yuniesky Betancourt on a shallow fly to Matt Kemp in center and, still throwing 96 mph, got ahead of Hairston 0-2. But the veteran fouled off two pitches before knocking a high fastball up the middle for a two-run single.

It counted for Eovaldi's first major league loss. In his six innings, he gave up one run on five hits and three walks, with three strikeouts. He evened his record at 1-1 and left his earned-run average at 2.12.

Greinke went one additional inning, and it at least proved memorable for Tony Gwynn Jr. Gwynn hit his first home run of the season, a span of 274 plate appearances.

Greinke (12-4) left after seven innings, giving up one run on five hits and three walks. He struck out eight.

The Brewers scored an additional run thanks to wildness by reliever Josh Lindblom and poor defense by catcher Dioner Navarro in the bottom of the seventh. Jonathan Lucroy led off with a single and went all the way to third on a wild pitch by Lindblom that Navarro mistakenly tried to backhand.

Lucroy scored when Lindblom threw another wild pitch in the dirt that Navarro again failed to try to block.

The Dodgers' third consecutive loss to the Brewers left them 55-67 this season.

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-- Steve Dilbeck

Photo: Nathan Eovaldi. Credit: Scott Boehm / Getty Images

Rounding out the Top Ten coolest Dodgers of all time, and then the not-so-cool

Hey, I can do cool. Not personally, maybe, unless rounded, balding, middle-aged dudes are finally in fashion.

But here in Wednesday’s Times, Chris Dufresne had a fun read on his 50 coolest athletes in Southland history.

Any list with Johnny Weissmuller and "Gorgeous" George Wagner in its Top 5 is OK by me.

His No.1 coolest, quite naturally, is Sandy Koufax. Just naturally cool. Three other Dodgers make his top 50 with Jackie Robinson at No. 15, Fernando Valenzuela at No.21 and Don Drysdale at No.30 (one behind wife Ann Meyers).

So figured I’d take a swing at filling out Dufresne’s start with the Dodgers’ Top Ten. Current Dodgers excepted:

5) Manny Ramirez: Yeah, I know. But in his offbeat, dreadlocked, beat-to-his-own-drummer way, he was cool. Nothing was cooler than his impact on the ’08 Dodgers.

6) Kirk Gibson: Not your prototypical version of cool, but he was a unique firebrand who dominated a room. Also, when he was going good, an all-time quote.

7) Steve Yeager: Admit it, even though you never have, don’t you feel like you partied with this dude?

8) Chuck Connors: Hey, he was "The Rifleman." Nothing was ever cooler than that. So cool, I can even forget he was once a Boston Celtic.

9) Steve Sax: OK, so he tilts a little toward the goofy side of cool, but there’s room for one.

10) Wes Parker: He just looked smooth whatever he was doing. Playing first, swinging, standing in the clubhouse. Still the only Claremont McKenna College player to make the bigs.

Honorable mention: Eric Young (the smile), Wally Moon (Moon shots alone), Rick Monday (his iconic moment), Eric Karros (hair), Wee Willie Keeler (name alone), John Wetteland (played guitar).

The Uncool Top Ten: Orel Hershiser (aw, shucks), Burt Hooton (looking for a plow), Kevin Brown (temper, temper), Rickey Henderson (too much effort), John Tudor (such attitude), Milton Bradley (he could have been cool; he could have been a lot of things), Steve Garvey (see: Rickey Henderson), Jeff Hamilton (has yet to speak), J.D. Drew (mannequin man), Juan Marichal (because we have long memories).

-- Steve Dilbeck

Top photo: Manny Ramirez. Credit: Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times

Middle photo: Wes Parker. Credit: Los Angeles Times

Bottom photo: Steve Yeager. Credit: Los Angeles Times

Locally, they decide Andre Ethier is the retiring sort

Andre Ethier is scheduled to have his high school number retired Wednesday in a ceremony at his Phoenix high school, St. Mary’s.

Ethier wore No.14 at St. Mary’s, before continuing to star locally at Gilbert-Chandler Community College and then Arizona State. He wears No.16 for the Dodgers.

Tommy Lasorda will speak at the St. Mary’s event, which will be hosted in the school gym by Dodgers announcer Rick Monday.

Ethier is coming off a career year for the Dodgers, establishing personal bests in home runs (31), RBI (106), doubles (42), hits (162) and runs (92). He also led the majors with six walk-off hits.

-- Steve Dilbeck