Playing Dodger baseball must be like giving speeches in Las Vegas.
There’s one distraction after another, so how can you stay focused on the task in front of you?
Hollywood, with all of its glamour and enticements, beckons. The weather is stupendous, and has been known to be so intoxicating that it has beguiled top-ranked college quarterbacks into ditching squad workouts in favor of surfing.
Sure, there is the occasional player like Jeff Kent, who eschews the local temptations and stoically soldiers his way through season after season. But he’s unusual.
Dodgerland is a magnet for the flamboyant and eccentric, for people like Gary Sheffield, a true Drama King, for bad drivers like Raul Mondesi, and for sourpusses like Kevin Brown.
A Teflon team, nothing seems to stick around for very long, victories included.
Once more, in 2006, the Blue Crew seems set on finishing third or fourth in a still-mediocre division, despite the fact that it has a big payroll, a new GM and Manager.
Certainly, injuries are playing a role, with closer Gagne ailing. But there is something missing that makes a fan still sigh despite the off-season signings of nearly an entirely new infield, and some new pitchers.
Call it soul or savvy or fire in the belly, or all of the above; the Dodgers, for years now, have been missing it.
So, you can’t blame any particular owner, or manager, or set of players. Like an earth without molten magma at its core, the Dodgers are dwelling in a dead zone.
I don’t know if there’s an easy fix, or any fix, for that matter.
Tommy Lasorda might know something, and though he’s a great gabber, he’s silent on this topic.
Someone should buddy up to this guy, maybe after a nice meal, and ask: “So, what’s up with this team?”
Like a custodian at an institution, he might know something profound that others have missed. And if it has something to do with a Brooklyn soul, perhaps he can tip us off about waking it up from its long and deep sleep.
Dr. Gary S. Goodman, President of Customersatisfaction.com, is a popular keynote speaker, management consultant, and seminar leader and the best-selling author of 12 books, including Reach Out & Sell Someone® and Monitoring, Measuring & Managing Customer Service, and the audio program, “The Law of Large Numbers: How To Make Success Inevitable,” published by Nightingale-Conant. A Ph.D. from USC’s Annenberg School, a Loyola lawyer, and an MBA from the Peter F. Drucker School at Claremont Graduate University, Gary offers programs through UCLA Extension and numerous universities, trade associations, and other organizations in the United States and abroad. Headquartered in Glendale, California, he can be reached at (818) 243-7338 or at: gary@customersatisfaction.com
For more information about coaching, consulting, training, books, videos and audios, please go to: http://www.customersatisfaction.com
