I just don’t know if I have the stomach for it.

And I do wonder if that makes me less of fan.

I am hoping that that is a sign of more maturity or wisdom – because you’ve always struck me as having a goodly amount of both, which are two things I hope to accumulate more of – because I used to get far more upset about things like this as a younger man, but as I age I find myself trying to be more even keel. I’d like to believe I’m getting more mature and finally getting a smidgen of wisdom.

But I also think that I am fortunate to know the highs (even if I had no understanding of stat analysis in that glory time of 1977-1988). For the more recent fan, this off-season has been bitter and certainly I understand their frustrations.

Jon has a way of making you feel introspective doesn’t he? Even though I write for a Dodger blog I can easily say I’m less of a fan then I was 35 years ago, but I’d be disappointed in myself as a person if I still behaved the way I used to at age 15 when it came to sports.

As to your points, they are all valid, the problem most Dodger fans seem to be having is that your points are only valid if you have the limited resources the Dodgers have. Sure Wolf or Hudson may be overpaid for one year, but in the business of baseball I’d consider yourself lucky if you only have to overpay for one year instead of having to lock yourself into a multi year deal with a less talented player.

I think its the conventional baseball wisdom that is being disregarded here by the Dodgers. Just because Randy Wolf accepts arbitration doesn’t mean he goes to an arbitration board. Just because a player accepts arbitration that you have to keep him. Just because you don’t want to pay for the 4 possible draft picks doesn’t mean you just don’t pick up two guys with near certainty to decline.

 If we’re going to build a team from the farm system, then we need as many bullets we can get from early round picks. If we’re building this team from free agency, then Wolf and Hudson can great complementary pieces. Instead, we’re acting like- I can’t even pretend we’re acting like a small market team since even the Twins, Rangers, and Rockies offered arbitration to their higher salaried players like Pavano, Ivan Rodiguez, and Marquis.

Frank McCourt probably feels that his Front Office team hasn’t been very lucky in the results of his recent signings.

then again one could also make the argument that that they’ve nothing but lucky with their late signings of cast offs and their reclamation projects …

then that’d make people who scream “We want Sherrill!” when Jonathan Broxton walks one batter- and that batter happens to be a guy named Pujols- the biggest fans of the world. So we can throw that argument out the window.

Your approach- and Jon Weisman’s, for that matter- are probably healthier. Getting so worked up about things you can’t control do you no good- believe me, I know. Nevertheless, kind of like Cool Dudes, I can’t stomach what’s going on now. Hopefully, better days are ahead, because I don’t really want to give up following baseball, as I’ve done in the past when the nonsense outweighs the joy of it. Guess we’ll just have to see how it all turns out…