The once-proud Los Angeles Dodgers — considered the blue-chip standard organization for decades in major league baseball — come to Washington as a broken, bankrupt franchise. The Dodgers begin a four-game series against the Nationals on Monday with reports surrounding the team that a Los Angeles businessman — backed by Chinese investors — wants to buy the beleaguered franchise for $1.2 billion.
Is that what it has come to for the franchise that brought major league baseball to the West Coast, won five World Series and nine National League pennants and established a palace known as Dodger Stadium in a place called Chavez Ravine?
The $1.2 billion bid has some hoops to jump through to be taken seriously, but the state of the Dodgers — bankrupt and in confusion after the divorce of owners Frank and Jamie McCourt — is for real.
Baseball commissioner Bud Selig has made it clear that he wants Frank McCourt out as the owner. The future of the team could wind up being decided in bankruptcy court — just like the future of another once-proud franchise was decided 18 years ago.
How did that work out for the Baltimore Orioles when Peter Angelos emerged as the owner from those court proceedings 18 years ago?
The franchise just up the road in Baltimore was the blueprint for the business of baseball with six American League pennants and three World Series titles over 18 season.
Now both of these franchises are struggling — the Dodgers financially, and the Orioles winding up a 14th straight losing season.
Forty-five years ago, though, both organizations met in a memorable World Series that featured seven future Hall of Famers — Jim Palmer, Luis Aparicio and Frank and Brooks Robinson for the Orioles, and Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale and Don Sutton for the Dodgers.
Los Angeles was on a run of three World Series titles over seven years, starting in 1959, including a four-game sweep of the New York Yankees in 1963 and a seven-game series win over the Minnesota Twins in 1965. It was the dominance of the Koufax and Drysdale era.
The Orioles’ era of excellence — sparked by the start of the amateur player draft and the value of player development — started with this 1966 season. The franchise stunned the baseball world with a four-game sweep over the favored Dodgers.
It started the beginning of the Orioles’ tenure of excellence that resulted in World Series wins in 1966, 1970 and 1983, while the Dodgers continued to excel with new personnel over the years, winning five pennants and two World Series, the last one in 1988.
The Los Angeles Dodgers and the Baltimore Orioles were once the best baseball had to offer. Now, 45 years later, they are punch lines.
Examiner columnist Thom Loverro is the co-host of “The Sports Fix” from noon to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday on ESPN980 and espn980.com. Contact him at [email protected].
