Dodgers' sale: Falling deeper into the Frank McCourt rabbit hole

Even as we supposedly approach the end of this mescaline-shrouded trip of an ownership sale, the tale continues to grow curiouser and curiouser.

Really, the whole thing is so completely bizarre. The cast of characters is all over the map, beginning, of  course, with Frank McCourt, who bought the Dodgers with equity in a parking lot, mismanaged the team into bankruptcy and almost a billion in debt, and is still about to exit a ridiculously wealthy man.

And then there are the bidders. They include a guy who once interviewed to be their general manager (Dennis Gilbert), a guy who used to be their general manager (Fred Claire), a guy who used to be their manager (Joe Torre), a couple who used to play for them (Steve Garvey, Orel Hershiser) and a guy who used to own them (Peter O’Malley).

Then there are guys who won NBA championships (Magic Johnson), one who owns the current champion (Mark Cuban) and another who owns an NFL team (Stan Kroenke).

There are stupid-rich investment guys (Steve Cohen, Tom Barrack, Stanley Gold), stupid-rich guys who may yet jump in (Patrick Soon-Shiong, Ron Burkle), guys who are agents (Arn Tellum), who built TV networks (Leo Hindry) and actual TV networks (Fox, Time Warner, Comcast). Alas, sadly the Dilbeck Investment Group has been left a financial casualty, although the good news is I do get to keep the 2005 Accord.

Some have advanced and some have not, though apparently they can get slip back in if they only up their initial bid by another $200 million or so.

And yet somehow this ongoing sale still grows more fantastic. The Times’ Bill Shaikin reported that in addition to the original final eight approved by McCourt for the auction, there is a ninth named Jared Kushner, the 31-year-old son-in-law of Donald Trump. Listen, David Lynch hit on the head couldn’t come up with this stuff.

Kushner is the son of New York real estate mogul Charles Kushner, who served prison time for what the New Times said was for “orchestrating one of the more memorable get-even schemes perpetrated in the name of sibling rivalry. He had hired a prostitute to entrap his brother-in-law and captured their encounter on hidden camera to show his sister.” Aldous Huxley on a psychedelic flashback couldn’t come up with this stuff.

Baby-faced Jared Kushner has zero experience in sports management, though that hardly makes him unique in this group. His claim to fame is buying the New York Observer in 2006. He is now on his fourth editor. He also used family money to purchase a Manhattan office building for a record $1.8 billion in 2006, which the New York Times said is now bleeding money.

Shaikin said Kushner family money would primarily be used for his bid on the Dodgers. Ain’t that just swell? A silver-spooned sports neophyte with inherited money and connected to Trump. What could go wrong?

Maybe you think it cannot possibly grow more preternatural, but just wait, tomorrow calls.

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— Steve Dilbeck

Photo: Dodgers owner Frank McCourt bids farewell to retiring Manager Joe Torre in October of 2010. Now Torre could be part of the ownership group that McCourt selects to replace him. Credit: Jae C. Hong / Associated Press

Dodgers sign right-hander Jamey Wright as a nonroster invitee

The Dodgers signed veteran Jamey Wright Tuesday because … yeah, well, because they could. Because, why not?

He’ll be a nonroster invitee, so there’s no real risk involved. His chances of making the team out of spring are what you might call slim, as in Dee Gordon-standing-sideways kinda slim.

Dodgers have plenty of veterans in their bullpen now, so he’s not an answer there. They could badly use a left-handed reliever, which is swell, except Wright is right-handed.

And if he’s never lived up to that first-round pick by the Rockies status, he’s at least managed to hang around for a long time. He’s 37 now and made his major-league debut at age 21.

He spent last season with the Mariners, where he was at least decent enough. He appeared in 60 games, going 2-3 with a 3.16 ERA and a 1.33 WHIP. That’s actually a career-low ERA, and he’s been around for 16 seasons.

It’s that annual spring nothing-to-lose signing. Maybe injuries will enable him to sneak onto the roster. Maybe he starts at triple-A Albuquerque to see what happens. And maybe he has an opt-out clause should he not make the team.

A minuscule gamble, and sometimes they prove useful.

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Photo: Jamey Wright in 2006. Credit: Ronald Martinez / Getty Images

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

  

Dodgers' Frank McCourt: MLB owners' new inspiration

He is the key to the Dodgers’ 2012 season, the one player in a position to most affect whether the team is again mediocre, or poised to make a postseason run.

Andre Ethier, a dismayed Dodgers nation turns its eyes to you.

The Dodgers went into the off-season talking about how they would make a run at a big bat. As you just might possibly have noticed, it never arrived.

Now even if you’re doing the massive assuming the Dodgers are for 2012 -– Matt Kemp will approach the same numbers, Juan Rivera will still drive in runs, Juan Uribe can’t possibly be as awful as he was in 2011, Dee Gordon will hold up over the course of the season, James Loney will more closely resemble his second-half self -– that still doesn’t figure to be enough to lift the team into the playoffs.

The one player who has the potential to have a massively better year in 2012 is Ethier.

The extremely talented, emotional, hard-working, inconsistent, prideful, exasperating All-Star right fielder.

After the 2009 season, Ethier was on the verge of superstardom. He hit 31 home runs, had 106 RBI and completed his second consecutive season with a slugging percentage north of .500. He started 2011 like he might make a run at the triple crown. Then came a broken pinkie from which he never seemed to fully recover.

Last year there was an early 30-game hitting streak in an otherwise disappointing season. Finally there was that odd, they’re-making-me-play-hurt rant, followed by denial, followed by season-ending knee surgery.

His final 2011 numbers: .292 batting average, 11 homers, 62 RBI, 67 runs and a career-low .421 slugging percentage.

There is plenty of room for improvement there, and if Ethier can do it, he can provide that big bat that was sorely missing last year. He is the one player who can make a dramatic difference in the Dodgers' lineup.

Which doesn’t mean it will happen, though I suspect it will. Still, prophesying Ethier’s future performance is like trying to predict the next Alec Baldwin remark. Could be really good, could be what the hell?

Now there are a couple of very good reasons to anticipate Ethier will bounce back with a huge season. Presumably he is healthy, his knee surgery was not major and that pinkie certainly should have healed by now. And he is in his contract year. He signed a one-year, $10.95-million deal this winter and can become a free agent for the first time at the end of the coming season.

General Manager Ned Colletti said the Dodgers were interested in signing Ethier to a long-term deal, which so far hasn’t happened. Ethier took notice of Chad Billingsley getting a three-year deal last spring, and that was long before Kemp signed his $160-million deal this off-season.

Ethier may determine he'll be in a better negotiating position after putting in a full, healthy season, whether re-signing with the Dodgers or hitting the open market. Or maybe he would prefer the security of a big contract right now. It’s Ethier, so it’s a guessing game.

Dodgers Manager Don Mattingly said Ethier gave away 100 at-bats last season by letting his emotions get the best of him. That was almost 20% of his season. For a guy who bats in the middle of the order.

Ethier turns 30 in April, so you would like to think he’s maturing enough to stay focused and not allow setbacks to send him gyrating off course. He is an intelligent and, when he wants to be, highly charming (as demonstrated in the following MLB.com video) player. He and Kemp could own this town.

And if the Dodgers are going to contend, he’ll need to.

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-- Steve Dilbeck

Dodgers' Frank McCourt: MLB owners' new inspiration

Hey, fight that laughter. I’m serious. Well, you know, mostly serious.

So how could the man who mismanaged the Dodgers so badly that  Commissioner Bud Selig had a lieutenant take over the team's daily control, who shamed the team by dragging it into  bankruptcy court, who has become a local and national laughingstock and whose fans deserted him in record numbers act as a beacon to his fellow Major League Baseball owners?

Because he’s about to make them all richer. OK, make that, even richer.

Not only are the Dodgers about to break a record for a baseball team sale price, they’re going to shatter it. And it appears they may be sold at twice what Forbes estimated their value to be less than a year ago.

Forbes has pretty much set the standard for evaluating the worth of professional sports franchises, and it is usually very accurate. But Forbes, like most everyone else, apparently misjudged the escalating effect of media rights deals.

In March, Forbes estimated the Dodgers to be worth $800 million. And then their attendance dropped by more than 600,000 in 2011.

No matter, McCourt believes he will get at least $1.5 billion in the sale of this team, maybe more. All indications from the veiled process indicate he’s going to get it. Larry King, part of the Dennis Gilbert group, said they failed to advance to the second round after an initial bid of $1.25 billion.

The current record for the sale of a team is the $845 million the Cubs brought in 2009.

If the Dodgers get twice what they were estimated to be worth, MLB owners will sit back and lap up a trickle-down effect. It’s the rising-tide effect. And the irony is too great. The one owner they most despised and wanted gone is about to make them all wealthier on his way out.

It has William Juliano at The Captain’s Blog wondering if McCourt’s success might inspire other MLB owners to sell, particularly those in major markets. The troubled Mets seem a prime candidate.

At least eight bidders have advanced to the second round of the auction. Eight deemed well-heeled enough to approach McCourt’s desired price. They’re hardly all from Los Angeles, which is going to leave at least seven of the obscenely rich who desire an MLB team without one.

Other owners are surely taking notice. Just don’t expect a note of gratitude to be headed McCourt’s way.

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Potential Dodgers owners already reaching out to Derrick Hall

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-- Steve Dilbeck

Potential Dodgers owners already reaching out to Derrick Hall

Could Derrick Hall, the Dodgers’ former vice president of communications and the Arizona Diamondbacks' current president and chief executive officer, return as the Dodgers’ next team president?

Yahoo Sports’ Steven Henson said several groups in the running to purchase the team from Frank McCourt have already approached Hall about becoming the Dodgers’ lead executive should they prove to have the winning bid.

Henson wrote a terrific piece about Hall, 43, and his recent battle with prostate cancer. Hall had surgery two months ago and received great news after a recent follow-up test.

Hall is one of the most likable, intelligent and dynamic individuals you could ever meet. He is a huge reason the Diamondbacks were selected as the best sports organization in the world to work for by the United Nations. You know, the kind of honors that used to go to the bankrupt Dodgers.

Hall was the first to figure out what Frank and Jamie McCourt were about and tender his resignation. He is such a bright star in baseball circles that many see him as a leading contender to replace Commissioner Bud Selig when he retires. Should that ever actually happen.

Stop the presses! Ronald Belisario spotted at Dodgers camp

There’s goes that spring suspense. Anyway, I think so. When the subject is Ronald Belisario (pictured above in 2010), it’s difficult to be certain of much.

Belisario had visa issues in each of the last three springs, apparently never getting one last year. At least he was never seen on U.S. soil.

But now comes word that -- maybe you should sit down -- Belisario not only already has his visa, but is at the Dodgers’ Camelback Ranch facility in Phoenix.

ESPN/L.A.'s Tony Jackson dropped by the team's "young guns" camp at Camelback on Sunday and guess who was there: everyone’s favorite hard-throwing, Venezuelan right-hander. Next thing I know, you’ll tell me Don Mattingly went drag queen in a Christmas show.

The Dodgers had better make sure he doesn’t go home for a visit before pitchers and catchers report Feb. 20. Not that the Dodgers would be wise to count on anything when it comes to Belisario.

He was something his rookie season (2.04 ERA, 1.15 WHIP, 8.2 strikeouts per nine innings), if you disregard that DUI incident. The next season, late to camp again (presumably because the DUI affected his visa request), he was sometimes brilliant but mostly a mess (5.04, 1.29, 6.2). And that’s not counting his disappearance for a month reportedly to enter rehab.

Then came the announcement last December that Belisario had been suspended for 25 games for violating baseball’s drug policy. Given his history, the suspension might almost work in the Dodgers’ favor. It gives the team additional time to monitor his progress after sitting out all last season, and to make sure he’s clean and has his head together.

He has a lot to prove to win back the Dodgers’ trust, but apparently he’s here and ready to go for it. That alone is real progress, even if a suspense killer.

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-- Steve Dilbeck

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Dodgers' auction is a private affair, exasperation and all

So they’re already whittling down the list of potential new owner of the Dodgers, and perhaps you’d like an explanation.

Sorry, wrong auction. Wrong process. Wrong men.

It’s a frustrating time for Dodgers fans, eager to know what is going on and who the next owner of their team will be. We know the dates the sale is operating under and a few general guidelines, but really that’s about it.

How many groups submitted bids? Was it 10, 12, up to 20? We’ve seen reports on all. And who were they exactly? We have names of most, or at least we think we do, but that doesn’t mean all.

On Friday the global investment firm conducting this auction for Frank McCourt, Blackstone Advisory Partners, began notifying groups whether they had advanced through the first round.

That in itself was surprising, since even the bidders were uncertain when Blackstone would make the first-round cuts. It’s also uncertain exactly how much influence McCourt had on the preliminary cuts and whether it was based strictly on the significance of their initial bids. The bids came in only on Monday.

The Times’ Bill Shaikin reported at least eight groups have advanced, though not all are known. Among those not moving forward were Mark Cuban, Dennis Gilbert and Steve Garvey/Orel Hershiser.

What prevented them from getting a ticket into the next round? We don’t know that either, though the assumption is their opening bid was too low or they were simply deemed not having the necessary financial resources. Good thing for McCourt he was never vetted like this.

Of course, as much as it’s said the Dodgers belong to the people of Los Angeles and are a civic treasure, ultimately they are a privately held company. The sale has every right to proceed behind closed doors. McCourt doesn’t have to say anything until he announces the winner by April 1.

McCourt, who purchased the team for $421 million in 2004, apparently wants at least $1.5 billion. So even if he is about a billion in debt, he’s still going to come out of this having made a ridiculous profit. Shaikin wrote the final bidding could even be in the range of $1.5 billion to $2 billion.

Blackstone apparently has cut a surprising number of initial bidders, leaving fewer for Major League Baseball to approve before turning over the final list to McCourt to select from.

How long will MLB take to approve those advanced by Blackstone? We don’t know that, either. We don’t know a lot of mechanisms involved here. It’s a tad maddening, but the only explanation required is the final one.

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-- Steve Dilbeck

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Dodgers didn't need to be in on bloated Prince Fielder deal

There, now, feel better?

Prince Fielder has finally signed, and a shock to no one who has ever heard the name Frank McCourt, it was not with the bankrupt Dodgers. Which as it turns out, is a good thing.

Scott Boras — and his name isn’t normally preceded with "super-agent" for nothing — got Fielder a nine-year, $214-million contract with the Detroit Tigers. A team, it should be noted, that wasn’t even supposed to be in on Fielder.

That is not only a stunning amount of dinero, but a stunning number of years too.

Now, I know there was undeniable logic to the Dodgers signing Fielder and it was dreamy and all, but at that price and those years, they should have passed.

Even if ownership was stable, I’d have taken a pass. Even if flush, I would have resisted.

I don’t trust that body (5-11, 280) to stay healthy and at the same productive level over the course of nine years, or even close. And do you really want to be shelling out $214 million to Fielder when you’re paying $160 million to Matt Kemp? And a big payday still looms for Clayton Kershaw?

Why Dodgers -- despite it all -- can still win the NL West

Because they play in a division where there is always hope. Every season, for most every team. Like it's required.

Parity hasn't simply arrived in the National League West, it's taken up residence. Not some shingle temporarily hung on the wall, but carved in granite at the front door.

The Arizona Diamondbacks finished last in the NL West in 2010 and then won the division last season. In five of the last six seasons, an NL West team coming off a losing season advanced to the postseason the next year.

The Dodgers are filled with "ifs" and crossed fingers and gambles. Not unlike every team in the division.

If Andre Ethier and Juan Uribe return to form, if James Loney hits like he did in the second half, if Matt Kemp approaches his 2011 season, if Juan Rivera can keep up his RBI form, if Dee Gordon can perform over a full season, if young closers Javy Guerra and Kenley Jansen can keep it going, if new starters Aaron Harang and Chris Capuano pitch effectively ... then the Dodgers win!

There is no juggernaut in the NL West, no powerhouse team, nothing even approaching a dominant club.

Getting all emotional about purchasing the Dodgers

Do you love the Dodgers? Do you just love them sooo much? So much than when reason screams — “Stop, what in the hell are you thinking?” — love whispers — “Ah, come on, what’s another $100 mil?”

Love can do that to someone, of course, get them all out of whack, making goofy decisions that turn the rational side of their brain into goo.

And this love affair comes equipped with something money can buy — status. Not just red-Porsche status or even side-by-side Malibu homes status. That’s just so common.

We’re talking the super-elite. Owning not just a Major League Baseball team but one of the most iconic teams in baseball history, situated in one of America’s most glamorous cities.

Bids for the Dodgers are due Monday, and all indications are the investment firm handling the auction could receive up to 20 preliminary proposals.

And one of them is apparently going to pay way more than the team is actually worth. Last March, Forbes estimated that the Dodgers were worth $800 million. Now they’re expected to fetch well over $1 billion. Maybe much more.

Which means you can look at all the flow sheets and income projections and potential TV media rights packages you want, but in the end if you want to come out on top of the auction, the bankrupt Dodgers are going to cost a lot more than makes practical business sense.