Monday, June 14, 2010

Dylan Hernandez, Thorn in Joe Torre's Side

Sometimes it must suck to be a Dodgers employee — because you have to answer questions about the latest McCourt embarrassment. Or in Joe Torre's case, not answer them. From "Dodgers noncommittal about role of Vladimir Shpunt" by Dylan Hernandez at the LA Times:

Torre's first season with the Dodgers was Shpunt's last. Asked whether he felt the division title won by the Dodgers in 2008 was in any way tainted because of help they received from Shpunt, Torre replied, "I'm not going there."

A member of the 14-person committee that reviews on-field issues, Torre would not say whether the use of sorcery was raised during the group's conference call last week.

"I'm not allowed to divulge what goes on in our conference calls, but thanks for asking," he said.

Does Torre consider the use of long-distance energy transfers cheating?

"Don't bother me," he said. "Please don't bother me."

Shpunt, who was paid bonuses of at least six figures, claimed he could improve a team's chances of winning by 10% to 15%. Told that Shpunt might have had a greater impact on the Dodgers than he had, Torre smiled and said, "I'm against domestic violence, but you're not a member of my family."

Did Torre ever feel "V energy"?

"Get out of here," he said.

Hard to tell if Torre was smiling when he gave those replies, but kudos to Hernandez for asking the hard questions. It must have taken a lot of V energy to do that.

UPDATE: From @dylanohernandez:

Torre was smiling as he said all of this, by the way. #VEnergy

2 comments:

Mr. LA Sports Czar said...

No way Dylan actually expected an answer.

Greg Zakwin said...

The domestic abuse line was actually pretty funny. Touche Joe Torre.