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Soboroff: On the Wrong Side of Dodgers History

April 21st, 2011 · 1 Comment · Baseball, Dodgers

Steve Soboroff has done good things for greater Los Angeles. He has taken on some tough jobs over the past 20 years and helped make life better, most prominently as a key aide to Richard Riordan when the latter helped get Los Angeles back on its feet after the chaos of the early 1990s.

But he is dead wrong in defending his new boss, Frank McCourt, whom he insists is a changed man since divorce proceedings, and in claiming Bud Selig was in error by taking control of the Dodgers from McCourt.

Perhaps it is understandable, in that the Selig announcement came down on what apparently was Soboroff’s second full day working for McCourt. He thought he was coming in to retrieve a rocky situation, which he has done before, and within hours he is overlooking … nothing.

Let’s see what Soboroff had to say.

Steve Dilbeck of the Los Angeles Times has what appears to be a full transcript of comments Soboroff made in the press box at the stadium today.

The talking points:

–McCourt is not the same guy, following the divorce which showed him and his ex-wife to be self-indulgent cretins who apparently took $100 million out of the Dodgers for their personal use.

–For all his flaws, McCourt was in charge when the Dodgers franchise became far more valuable then when he purchased it, in 2004.

–MLB taking over the Dodgers but not the Mets, who also are in financial trouble, shows a bias against the Dodgers.

My take?

Soboroff was all fired up to fix the Dodgers, and the rug was pulled out from under him. Now he just looks silly, and he’s annoyed and embarrassed. I assume he already has taken some of Frank’s money to be defending him like this.

But what matters here is this: The Frank McCourt Era is over. If he and/or Soboroff really care about Los Angeles, they will get out of the way and stay out of court and let this unfold.

Soboroff is standing athwart history, and that is an awkward place to be. He can yammer about The New Frank … and it doesn’t matter. McCourt may be ready to become a monk, and it doesn’t matter. He and his wife took actions over a span of years which alienated fans, made Dodgers baseball an entity of questionable value and embarrassed city fathers.

It’s over. Soboroff will figure it out when he settles down. He’s too smart a guy not to understand it. For starters, he will notice soon that he is the only prominent person in Los Angeles defending Frank McCourt.

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1 response so far ↓

  • 1 tomas // Apr 22, 2011 at 3:49 PM

    “But what matters here is this: The Frank McCourt Era is over.”

    Hip Hip Hooray

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