Dodger Fans Losing Their Childlike Faith

How many Fortune 500 companies have 31-year-olds as the chief architects of their organizations?

There are good reasons why the answer is not many. I don’t care how much potential he has, at 31, Paul DePodesta is a kid.

Does anyone honestly believe that a 31-year-old has the negotiating prowess, experience and business acumen to be a baseball general manager?

I’ve been deeply skeptical of Frank McCourt from the start. This just reinforces that belief. I’m convinced that McCourt’s ownership of our cherished team will be a disaster.

Michael McKinney

Irvine

*

First, the Dodgers fail to upgrade their worst-in-the-league offense.

Second, they ship out arguably their best starter.

Third, they fail to re-sign a relief pitcher, Paul Quantrill, who led the league in innings the last two seasons.

Fourth, a man who had never set foot in Dodger Stadium buys the team.

Fifth, the man who bought the team has no money to upgrade the team.

And now, lucky us. Paul DePodesta is named GM. Are you kidding me? Was MC Hammer not available?

Geno Apicella

Burbank

*

New Dodger GM Paul DePodesta summed it all up brilliantly: “We have a definite need to score more runs than the other guys.� Well, thank God, DePodesta has a handle on this most intricate and important aspect of the game. I was beginning to worry.

Steve Smith

Pasadena

*

Bill Plaschke’s column on the hiring of Paul DePodesta (With Luck, the Dodgers Won’t Crash, Feb. 17 ) was unprofessional to the point of being offensive.

He labels DePodesta a “computer nerd� and “General Manager.com,� terms that probably reveal more about Plaschke’s insecurities than they do about DePodesta.

Plaschke even invokes the spirit of Branch Rickey -- who, Plaschke would have us believe, must be rolling over in his grave because the Dodgers dared to hire a GM who looks at statistics.

Is Plaschke unaware that Rickey himself was considered the Godfather of Stats, and that he invented many of the forms of statistical analysis DePodesta and his peers use today?

The readers of The Times deserve better than Bill Plaschke’s delusional rantings. I applaud the Dodgers for hiring the right man for the job.

Eric Enders

Cooperstown, N.Y.

*

Bill Plaschke observes that new Dodger GM “DePodesta’s style didn’t win any more playoff series than Kevin Malone’s style or Dan Evans’ style.�

Over the last four seasons and 650 games, DePodesta’s “style� won more games than 28 other teams, including the Yankees. All this with a payroll that ranked 29th in 2001 and 28th in 2002.

But an 0-7 record in playoff clinchers tells Plaschke his method ultimately fails. Plaschke is so skeptical of statistics he fails to grasp the simple concept of sample size.

Luckily for Dodger fans, this is exactly the kind of thinking DePodesta exploits.

Brian Greene

Rolling Hills Estates

*

Dan Evans leaves the Dodgers far better off than he found them.

Evans came under intense media criticism for moves that have proved brilliant. He didn’t offer a contract to Chan Ho Park, who is on his way to being the biggest free-agent bust of all time. He signed Hideo Nomo and Kazuhisa Ishii instead. He bought out Jeff Shaw and traded Matt Herges, opening the closer job for Eric Gagne. The Herges trade netted Guillermo Mota, the highest-rated middle reliever in baseball. Evans believed in a career minor leaguer named Paul Lo Duca. He drafted can’t-miss prospects Edwin Jackson and Greg Miller.

In years to come, when Paul DePodesta is hailed as a genius for building a team around outstanding young pitchers, he should remember to give credit to Evans for not shipping them off last July.

Ryan Thomsen

Logan, Utah

*

I can’t stand to watch it any longer. The A-Rod trade is another example of how inept the Dodgers have been this off-season. For less than what we pay Darren Dreifort and Todd Hundley, we could have had A-Rod.

I am a Dodger fan through and through, but this is painful. We spend over $100 million a year to be almost good enough. Although we are one of 15 teams with a winning record this decade, we are one of two -- the Chicago White Sox are the other -- that haven’t made the playoffs.

While we were interviewing for general managers, the Yankees were making moves.

Tom Tyra

Manhattan Beach

*

How fast did the Alex Rodriguez trade occur?

It happened so fast that there wasn’t enough time for the Dodger publicity department to plant a story that the Dodgers were interested in him.

Ben Ostrow

Sherman Oaks

*

How could Frank McCourt let A-Rod slip through his fingers? I can’t believe that there was nothing he could have done. This guy had better wake up!

Edward Gallegos

Downey