Don Mattingly picks Cliff Lee over everyone in the playoffs

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Don Mattingly, the Dodgers new manager, was on the ‘Dan Patrick Show’ Wednesday and talked -- what else? -- baseball.

‘It’s the challenge that thrills me,’ he says of managing at the major league level. He also hopes last season was ‘a bump in the road.’ Hmmm.

Mattingly is realistic, though.

‘Can’t concern myself with stuff that I can’t control,’ he told Patrick. ‘If we’re not going to go out and spend money ... really can’t be concerned with it to the point of worrying about that. Just trying to get the players that you have and the players that we end up with -- which is gonna be a good nucleus -- and getting them to play the best baseball that they can play.’

So who would the former Yankees first baseman want on the mound when everything is on the line in a Game 7. Sabathia? Halladay? Lincecum? Lee?

‘Cliff Lee,’ he said, after initially saying any of the above. And then Mattingly, proving his work as Dodgers hitting coach is not a source of embarrassment for him, recalled how the Dodgers couldn’t do anything against Lee in the NLCS last year.

It should be noted that Mattingly on Tuesday began his stint as a manager in the Arizona Fall League. His Phoenix Desert Dogs lost to the Mesa Solar Sox, 8-3.

-- Debbie Goffa

Upper photo: Don Mattingly. Credit: Kelvin Kuo / US Presswire

Lower photo: Cliff Lee. Credit: Louis DeLuca / MCT