Ned Colletti Blinds Us With Blazing Insights

Hilarity ensued as I read Ken Gurnick's latest interview with Ned Colletti yesterday, as the piece set new standards of how to say something without saying anything at all:

DENVER -- General manager Ned Colletti, whose Dodgers started play Friday night tied for last in the National League West, said his club has shown signs of contending this season, but that isn't enough.

"You can always say 'if this, if that,' but 'if' is the most overused word in the English language when something doesn't go your way," said Colletti.

Actually, things haven't gone our way all season long, and I am pretty sure the most overused word on this blog is either an epithet or "(cries)". It sure as hell ain't "rancho ardiendo", not this year.

"I believe we're on the verge of doing good things, but we've still got to do them."

Hmm. What would Yoda say?

In a wide-ranging overview of the first 64 games, Colletti praised Matt Kemp for taking his game to another level "across the board," but implied that the club needs more players to join him if it wants to compete.

"I want to see us play better," Colletti said. "We easily could have been 5-1 coming out of Cincinnati and Philadelphia and we had a four-run lead twice last night but couldn't hold it. We were close, but you have to win those games. Close gives you hope, which is not bad to have, but it doesn't win you a game."

If you're keeping score at home: CLOSE --> HOPE; HOPE <> WIN

Colletti also elaborated on manager Don Mattingly's comments about the Thursday demotion of Jerry Sands and the promotion of Trent Oeltjen. Like Mattingly, Colletti felt Sands wasn't making the proper adjustments at the plate and needed to regroup in a less stressful setting. Among the reasons Oeltjen was promoted is the fact that he has a June 15 out in his contract and Colletti didn't want to lose his plus defense, so essentially he was kept over Jay Gibbons.

Colletti said Gibbons accepted an outright assignment to Triple-A Albuquerque. Juan Castro is considering the same.

He said the adjustments Sands needs to make in his swing are "a small fix. He doesn't need a makeover, but he needs to do it and make it part of what he does."

As opposed to Sands doing it but not making it part of what he does. That would suck.

Meanwhile, in other papers, Dylan Hernandez says that Colletti is not sure how to assess this team, even though we're over a third of the way through the season and we're fading out of contention before the all-star break. Come on, Ned. Even you've gotta be able to interpret this train wreck of a season.