WRITE ON: DODGERS COLUMNIST CONTEST.

MAGGIORA vs. GORCEY

History repeating itself

JOHN MAGGIORA

29

Baseball coach

Santa Clarita 

Flashback to 1987; the Detroit Tigers are in a pennant race and are in need of a veteran starting pitcher. The Atlanta Braves, meanwhile, are having another poor year and luckily for the Tigers are willing to trade right-hander Doyle Alexander to them for some young unproven pitcher named John Smoltz. Alexander would win nine games for the Tigers that year while leading them to the American League Championship Series while the Braves would suffer for a few more years before putting together a division winning streak that has been unrivaled to this day led by John Smoltz amongst others.

Why is this important to the Dodgers, specifically General Manager Ned Colletti? It's simple, the Braves are 11 1/2 games behind the division-leading New York Mets and the Mets don't look like they will fade down the stretch.

The Dodgers, on the other hand, are only 3 1/2 games behind the division leading San Diego Padres despite a horrible start to the second half. The Braves have a valuable commodity named John Smoltz. Smoltz has 15 career playoff wins and only 4 losses so he is especially good when it counts the most.

Sure it will cost a bevy of prospects. In fact, it's probably safe to say that it will cost the Dodgers prospect Joel Guzman. I'm sure Braves General Manager John Schuerholz will want Jonathan Broxton included as well as a low level starting pitcher and possibly a minor league reliever.

Trading Guzman may be tough to swallow for Dodger fans since he has been the poster boy of the Dodger Minor League System for the last few years, but he is a guy without a position at the big level. Losing Broxton would hurt, but Double-A reliever Mark Alexander was just promoted to Las Vegas and I'm sure it was not for the buffet at the Rio.

So the decision now lies with Ned Colletti. One thing to remember here is that this is Los Angeles, and we want to win now!

All in the family

RYAN GORCEY

20

UC Berkeley student

Camarillo

The Dodgers have a habit of choosing the wrong brother -- Chris Gwynn, Wilton Guerrero, Ramon Martinez (Pedro's older brother), Ken Brett, Glenn Hoffman, Jeff Weaver, and Mike Maddux.

For those keeping score, that's five brothers of future-Hall-of-Famers, one brother of a current Cooperstown resident, and Jeff Weaver.

On July 31, Ned Colletti can change that.

The Dodgers need starting pitching, but are in better position than most contending teams to actually acquire it.

With third base getting crowded with blue-chipper Andy LaRoche and Cesar Izturis, hot-hitting Willy Aybar has become tradable.

The Chicago Cubs need such a young stud to bolster what little hope they have now and what slightly more hope they have for the future, and are looking to jettison costly veterans.

This adds up to the Dodgers finally getting the right brother: Greg Maddux.

The best move for the pitching-starved Dodgers is to trade D.J. Houlton and Aybar -- an upgrade for the Cubs infield over Ronny Cedeno -- for Maddux. An overstuffed Dodgers infield makes for a cloudy future for Aybar and with a near-.300 batting average pushing his trade value to its peak, he is a logical centerpiece.

Houlton fills the Cubs' demand for pitching in return. Last year he was third among National League rookie starters in innings pitched and second in strikeouts, though he posted a 5.16 ERA.

In return, the Dodgers get a veteran nibbler with 29 playoff starts along with a 59-43 record and a 3.45 ERA against the rest of the NL West.

Maddux thrives down the stretch, posting ERA's of 2.88 in August, 3.19 in September, and 2.48 in October. The Madd Dog may be old, but he still has a few tricks left.

By leaving hitter-friendly Wrigley for pitcher-friendly Dodger Stadium (where Maddux has a 3.19 ERA), and trading mostly day games (3.28 ERA) for night games (2.90 ERA), becoming a Dodger puts Maddux in prime position to turn back the clock and add a Hollywood ending to a great career.

WAUGH vs. SOTELO

Ned should enter buyer's market

AL WAUGH

Let's suspend our disbelief for a moment and assume that the Dodger's post All-Star game swoon is not terminal and that Ned Colletti should be an active buyer and not a seller as the July 31 trading deadline approaches. This may not be easy, but let's try.

The Dodger's current lineup has about as much power as Fidel Castro's second in command -- they are next to last in the major leagues in home runs. They also have a starting pitchers lineup which contains Mark Hendrickson (the only 6'10'' pitcher in baseball history with no fastball), a rookie who can't find the strike zone and 68 year old Aaron Sele.

What to do? Everyone duly scours the free agent list and the buyers and sellers list and everyone ``discovers'' the same 4 or 5 players are Soriano, Abreu, Smoltz etc. We need some bold moves here; no one player is going to bail out this rapidly sinking ship.

So Ned, here is what you do: Call Seattle and bring back Adrian Beltre. He has been a huge disappoint to the Mariners who admittedly overpaid for him but he solves problems for both teams. Seattle rids itself of an above market contract. As for LA, he is a great defensive third baseman and he hit 48 homeruns in his last year as a Dodger. He is enormously popular in LA, never wanted to leave and is probably available for a combination of an unhappy Cesar (maternity leave) Izturis, (the Seattle shortstop is Yuniesky Betancourt for goodness sake) and minor league stud third baseman Andy LaRoche. Maybe you toss in a player to be named later.

Next Ned, you call the Cubs and hook Greg Maddux, again using prospects as bait. The Cubs are having a going out of business sale and are looking for young talent. Willy Aybar and/or Juan Guzman come to mind. Aybar is redundant if you trade for Beltre and Guzman has no natural position. Let 'em go.

With those two trades completed, Colletti's real heavy lifing lies ahead: finding someone, anyone, to take Odalis Perez off his hands. Good luck with that, Ned.