Having sat through a few dugout media sessions in September with Torre, he said enough to the media about Hudson that it wasn’t hard for anyone to figure out what was up.

Torre a few times in different situations throughout the year that he didn’t feel the need to sit down and discuss everything with each player, especially if he “knew they could handle it professionally.” Think of Blake, and later Kemp, batting 8th. Torre expressed trust in those guys that they wouldn’t upset the apple cart if he moved them down, almost as a sign of respect to them (at least that’s how he spun it to us). I’m sure the same thing went down with O-Dog.

Beautiful.

I’m not a hockey fan, but I have been to three LA Kings games (one at the Forum!) and it is a far, far better sport to see in person than on TV. If you understand the basics, you should enjoy it if you get out to a game. (Disclosure: one game I bought the tix in silent auction for charity, and the other two were free for me, so it wouldn’t have taken much to get my money’s worth. OTOH, my wife accompanied me to two of those games and she enjoyed them, even though she barely understands the rules – thank God she at least be exposed to AYSO, allowing offside to be an explainable concept – she really enjoyed the game, although she thought the fighting was “stupid” and “childish”.

I agree with Dave. Hockey in person is a totally different experience than watching on TV, more than any other sport. It’s a ton of fun. You should go with someone who knows the game to explain to you what to look for and what’s going on.

The fans are great too. LA has a good hockey tradition although if you go when they’re playing the Red Wings, Rangers, or Blackhawks be prepared for a ton of fans for the visiting team.

and then I read the rest of your comment.

So much speculation from two quotes that didn’t say much. Weak story.

Three paragraphs are supposed to be quoted:

From the way they go about their business, it’s clear that both Hudson and Torre have an old-school mentality.
There is little room for sit downs, conferences or complaining.
Torre has publicly said that he pulls younger players such as Clayton Kershaw and Jonathan Broxton aside when he feels necessary, but he generally leaves veteran players to deal with things in their own way.

Leaving only the first and last paragraphs as my words.

Yeah, from the tone of the dugout talks by Torre it was implied that Torre had already spoken with Hudson, or at least that there was communication. Very weird.

He played in the major leagues in every year of the 1960s. His first PA was to pinch-hit for Warren Spahn against Harvey Haddix – he singled – and the first major-league pitch he caught was thrown by Spahn. The men in the crowd still wore suits with hats. Joe is seriously old-school, from a time when men didn’t communicate by having touchy-feely meetings; everything was clearly understood from the actions taken. Color me not surprised.

He should have.

But he probably figured there was nothing to say as in there was nothing that O-dog was going to say that was going to change his mind and that even talking to him like that might be an insinuation that there was. There was nothing he was going to ask of the O-dog to do, or anything he did wrong, he was just benching him to go with the hot hand.

But that being said, he should have communicated better. People don’t understand things without explanation, that’s not the real world. Old school here is just wrong.

I was thinking the same thing. Also do people remember 3-4 times near the end of the year when Hudson went down cradling his wrist or looking like he was in pain?

but wouldn’t Joe have had to actually communicate with Hudson to see how his wrist felt, or do you think they simply decided that based on his performance his wrist was hurting and that he wouldn’t tell them the truth if they asked?

Out: Casey Blake popped out to second. None on with one out and George Sherrill due up.
Substitution: Orlando Hudson is pinch-hitting for George Sherrill.
Home-run: Pinch-Hitter Orlando Hudson one-out, solo Home Run (1) to left. Rafael Furcal due up.
….
Walk: Ronnie Belliard walked. Runners on first and second with one out and Andre Ethier due up.
…

So … a personal problem Torre has is bigger than the team? or what?