Dodger Fans: Be Glad it is Not 1992. Be Very Glad.

Since moving to Los Angeles in 1958, the Dodgers have had some very good seasons, some bad ones, some simply good, and one God awful season. 1992. What happened to this team to make it lose 99 games? That is by far, the most in LA Dodger history. The Los Angeles Dodgers have lost 90 games or more twice, 92, and 2005. Brooklyn lost 100 or more twice. LA also lost 89 a few times. But for a majority of their existence, they have been above .500. And in doing so, they have been to the playoffs 25 times, won 12 NL Pennants and 6 World Series. So let us look at the 1992 Dodgers.

The 1992 Dodgers were managed by everyone’s favorite. Tommy Lasorda. Fred Claire was the GM and the O’Malley’s still owned the team. The starting 8 featured 4 players 30 or older. One, Darryl Strawberry, would be gone after 43 games due to substance abuse. Only 2 players, Brett Butler and Mike Sharperson, posted BA above .300. Eric Davis, their big off-season trade acquisition, played in only 73 games and was nowhere near the player he was with the Reds. With those two out, it fell on the reserves to make up the difference.

Mitch Webster, Henry Rodriguez, Billy Ashley, Kal Daniels, Tom Goodwin, and Stan Javier were the guys who got the playing time. Webster played in 135 games and overall was the most productive of the bunch. The rest made minimal contributions. The starting infield, Karros, Harris, Offerman, and Hansen were all 27 or younger. Karros would win the ROY with a 20 HR, 88 RBI season. Offerman hit .260 with no power, Harris, more valuable as a PH most of the time, hits .270 with no power. Hansen hits 6 HR’s but only hits .214. He would later become a very prolific pinch hitter.

Mike Sharperson hit .300 in 128 games and was the Chris Taylor of that team. Todd Benzinger, another off-season pick up played in 121 games, but was mediocre at the plate, hitting .239 with only 4 HRs. Carlos Hernandez was Mike Scioscia’s backup and matched Scioscia’s power output with 3 HR’s. Eric Young Sr., Juan Samuel, Dave Anderson, and Rafael Bournigal was the infield reserves. None played exceptionally well.

The one offensive bright spot next to Karros’s ROY year was 35-year-old Brett Butler. Butler hit .309, stole 41 bases and had a .413 OBP. The team hit .248 and hit only 72 HRs.

The pitching was not very good. Of the six starters, 4 were over 30. Hershiser, Gross, Candiotti and Ojeda. Two were kids, Ramon Martinez and Pedro Astacio. Only Astacio finished with a .500 record, 5-5. The bullpen was not much better. Anchored by closer Roger McDowell, the pen won 15 and lost 31. Jim Gott, Tim Crews, Steve Wilson, John Candelaria, Jay Howell, Pedro Martinez, and Kip Gross all contributed to the ineptitude. For Hershiser, it was his first full season back after surgery. He finished at 10-15. At 33 his glory days in Dodger blue were behind him. A lot of the losses were due to an offense that was for the most part anemic. They scored 548 runs, They were in the lower half of almost all major hitting categories. They were 3rd in the league with 142 steals.

So, after this total train wreck of a season did they fire Lasorda? Were the fans outraged at the teams’ performance? Was there a call for firing the manager from the fans? Well, there might have been some discontent. But without the kind of social media coverage, there is today, about the only place you would have seen that was in the letters to the editor section of the LA Times.

No, Lasorda was retained on another one-year deal. A kid named Piazza lit up the NL and won the ROY in 93. The team climbed back to .500 at 81-81. Lasorda would remain until his heart attack in 96 and would have 3 more ROY’s, Mondesi, Nomo, and Hollandsworth. They would win the division in 95 and 96.

So having lived through all of that, their present situation is a lot less stressful. All we can do as fans is sit back and take them as they come. In the end, they will either make it to the playoffs, or they will not. Judgments of their season will be rendered after the season is over and only then will we see how good they are, or what shortcomings derailed what was considered the best Dodger team ever at the beginning of the year.

Just be so very happy that 1992 is so far in the rearview mirror and we have not had a season that disappointing for so very many years. My other thought is that Lasorda would not have been any more successful with this present team than Dave Roberts has been. Tommy would have shown more emotion though, and a few times would have no doubt been thrown out of the game with some of these umpires’ strike zones.

Since I started this post, the Dodgers won two edge-of-your-seat one-run extra-inning games. They were both exciting and exasperating at the same time. And after, the same complaints about Dave Roberts were voiced over and over. Look, as fans, you have every right to complain and bash the manager. It is in a fan’s DNA. But let us also take into consideration that Roberts, like even the greatest poker player of all time, must play the hand he is dealt.

Dave has had some very good players, this is true. This season the expectations on this team were higher than they have ever been. Injuries have derailed some of those expectations and poor play some others. The bench is not nearly as good as it was last year, and the starting pitching has been taxed since May went down, exacerbated by the loss of Kershaw and the Bauer debacle, and yet, they are still within striking distance of the division lead. The bullpen has had so many different faces that if anyone on here can name them all without looking at the internet, I would be totally amazed.

I am just happy I have been around to witness the success they have had the last 8 seasons. No Dodger team, not even the Boys of Summer had that kind of success. We all would like more Championship’s. Who wouldn’t? But it is really time to be glad for what we have and put the bad times behind us. We all here are Dodger fans. True Blue. Let’s act accordingly.