It's been a year to the day since I had my heart attack. June 5, 2009. They kept me in the hospital overnight and the next day (the anniversary of D-Day) The Pros from Dover put a stent in one of my coronary arteries; my doctor prescribed a bunch of medicines that lowered my risks; I changed my diet and added exercise to my daily routine.

I am still in the process of rethinking my life. I am working with an old friend to start a new business; I am working with God to update my spiritual activities.

But the Dodgers. The Dodgers. They still don't have enough pitching.

I suppose no team ever has enough pitching, especially in these days of three divisions in each league and twelve pitchers (twelve pitchers?) on each team. Really; each team can have twenty-five players. Do you really want twelve of them to be pitchers?

I don't think the number of pitchers matters. What matters is the quality, the ability of the pitchers you have.

My team is the Dodgers. I won't apologize for that.

But I have to say I am not overly impressed by the effectiveness of the pitchers on the Dodgers roster at the moment.

More to come.

Pitching and defense win championships, the old saying goes. But you also have to score some runs, and that means that as a team you have to get on base and move around to score. Which means you have to hit, or at least bat effectively.

The Dodgers play very good defense. They play the field aggressively, they turn the important plays, they make very few errors.

They pitch well enough, although I don't think their pitching intimidates anyone. Billingsley has come apart some, Kershaw has never quite come together this season. Both pitchers are young, I know, and probably have long careers ahead of them. But neither one has his head together yet. Kuroda may not quite have his head back together yet after being hit there by a line drive earlier this season; he couldn't finish the second inning yesterday. Randy Wolf had a pretty good season; Vicente Padilla has proven to be a valuable late-season pickup. The bullpen has been reliable, the best in the National League this season, so if the Dodgers can get the game to the seventh inning with a lead or down by just a run or two, they're in pretty good shape.

It's the hitting, the effective batting, that seems to be a problem now. In three games in the National League Championship Series they've scored just eight runs – and six of those were in a losing effort in game one. In those three games, they've left 27 runners on base. And although the Dodgers swept the Cardinals in the Division Series, they left 31 runners on base in those three games.

That's 58 runners left on base in six games. Their opponents left 39.

I am not an insider; I don't have access to the Dodgers clubhouse. But I know the Dodgers coaches, pitching coach Rick Honeycutt and batting coach Don Mattingly in particular, know their craft, and I'm sure they tell their young players what those players need to be told: trust your fastball, Mr. Kershaw, and remember you have a whole team on defense behind you; be patient, Mr. Kemp, and make sure it's in your zone before you swing....

One of the criticisms of the team last year was that the younger players didn't listen to the coaches or the older players. Some of the younger players came back saying We don't need to listen to them. To me, that seemed like the wrong attitude to have. I hope that as October and postseason play continue, that attitude hasn't snuck back in under the Dodgers' caps.

Hey, Dodgers.
Did you think it was just gonna come back to you? That you didn't have to (ohmigod) try a little? Exert some effort?
Hit the ball once in awhile?
Stop reading the crap in the Times about how wonderful you are and start doing the job, guys.
Maybe you need your butts kicked from inside the clubhouse, the way Jeff Kent did last year. Stop loafing and play your hearts out!
That's all any of us fans really want. You've played the last week or ten days like you don't even have hearts.
And Joe Torre and the coaches can't do it for you. You're the ones who have to go out there and see the ball, hit the ball, catch the ball.
You still don't have enough pitching, but that doesn't matter right now. You could overcome that. But right now, you don't look like you have enough anything!
Come on, boys, play the game like you want to be there, like you want to win!

I thought it was the pitching

Dang! I thought the pitching was gonna be the Dodgers' comeuppance. The pitching has come through, although whether it will come through in the playoffs and the Series if they get there after, we'll see. But the pitching has held up, and with the addition of Padilla and Granger and Sherrill (did I leave anybody out?) okay.

But what has happened to the hitting? 10 runners left on base, 8 in scoring position. 8 runners left on base, 6 in scoring position. Manny can't find Mannywood with a compass. Kemp skies a few but not when it's most needed.

Batting is the ultimate Zen. In this moment, of this moment. See the ball, hit the ball.

Stop thinking so hard, boys; see your pitch and swing the bat. Hit that horsehide into Pasadena.

Having a Heart Attack

Having a heart attack changed my life. It could do the same for you.

A heart attack isn’t something you want to go through and I wouldn’t wish one on anybody. But if you have to have one (and some of us just can’t avoid it) you might as well embrace the changes it makes to your life. The changes can’t be avoided anymore than the heart attack, so you might as well hug them close and accept them as your own. They’re going to be with you for a long time.

I had my heart attack on Friday, June 5. Never saw it coming. No symptoms. No weakness, no shortage of breath no chest pains, no palpitations. Just a sudden wrenching, squeezing, nauseating pain that doubled me over and made me sweat blood.

I was at work when it happened; I managed to drive home. I should have called 9-1-1, but I didn’t want to admit that I had what I had. I called my wife instead.

“Call 9-1-1,” she said.

“No, I’ll wait for you,” I told her. “I’ll be okay.”

After two and a half hours of pain, I thought about praying. I don’t know why I waited so long. As soon as I started the Rosary, the pain vanished.

“I believe in God,” I said, and the pain went away. Of course I prayed the entire Rosary.

When I finished, my wife arrived home and took me to the hospital. She stayed with me through a long weekend of minimally-invasive surgical procedures, EKGs and recovery. The doctors sent me home on Monday along with a bag of drugs I have to take everyday and several pamphlets full of suggestions.

“I always thought it would be the other way around,” my wife told me. “I thought it would be you praying for me.”

The changes in my life? I get up early every morning and walk, for at least an hour. I tend to walk around the perimeter of the local golf course and collect lost golfballs. Found a TopFlight last week. I pray more. I take work less seriously, even though in these times of economic challenge the owner of the business where I work would prefer me to take it more seriously.

And my marriage has changed. After 32 years of sleeping together, my wife now sleeps alone in what used to be our son’s room. We barely talk. I get up early and go walking; she gets up and goes to work. She comes home late. We haven’t shared a meal together in a month. I have reached out to friends I hadn’t talked to in years, because I need someone to talk to. I trust she has too; I heard her on the phone with someone the other day, laughing in a way I haven’t heard her laugh in months. Hearing her laugh made me feel good for her.

I couldn’t avoid the heart attack or the changes that followed. I saw my doctor last week; he said as long as I keep walking and taking my drugs I should be just fine.

“Call me anytime,” he said. “But I don’t want to see you for six months.”

My wife feels the same way, I think.

But it’s all okay. This moment, this moment right here, is a good one. And that’s really all any of us has the right to hope for.

This was Kershaw's game.

It went 15 innings and the Dodgers lost. But this was Kershaw's game.

50 years ago, 40 years ago, Kershaw would have gone out there to pitch the ninth inning, and the guys in the field would have given their all to make sure he got the win.

End of eight innings, the Dodgers led 1 - 0. Clayton Kershaw deserved the chance to pitch the 9th and win the game for himself.

Dodger manager Joe Torre, following along with the prevailing thinking among managers, turned the game over to his closer, Jonathan Broxton.

But that was the wrong thing to do.

Broxton gave up the tying run and the game went 15 innings and the Cardinals won.

Torre should have given the ninth inning to Kershaw to win or lose.

I think he would have won.

Still Not Enough Pitching

The Dodgers still don't have enough pitching.

Sure, they lead the National League West by 7-1/2 games.

Sure, they have the best record in the major leagues at 31 - 15 after 46 games.

But the starting pitchers have not been able to pitch enough innings.

The Dodgers cannot continue to win if their starting pitchers pitch just 5 or 6 innings every game. The starting pitchers have to finish 7 or 8 innings, consistently, if the team is going to go all the way to the World Series.

The Dodger offense has come together; the Dodgers gang up on their opponents, now, hitting hit after hit after hit.

7 runs in one inning, 8 in another today.

But Stults (who has a complete game this year) couldn't finish the fifth... couldn't get credit for the win today, even though it was his to take, if he could just have nailed it down.

I am beginning to wonder about the effectiveness of Dodgers pitching coach Rick Honeycutt. He was not a winner; he pitched in the major leagues for 13 years, but his overall record was 95 - 125. I remember him as a nibbler - a pitcher who tried to throw pitches that just missed the strike zone, hoping the batter would swing at them.

In today's game (5/25/09; the Dodgers won 16 - 6), the Dodger pitchers walked 11 Rockies. I guess you can get away with that in Coors Field as long as you can hit. But you can't win the division, the league or the World Series by nibbling.

You have to throw strikes.

I'm not sure the Dodgers have enough pitchers who can throw enough strikes to win the season. We'll see.