Last night, Bob Sacks, a lawyer who represents Frank McCourt, spoke with Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times. The subject: Frank McCourt’s response to Major League Baseball’s rejection of the television deal McCourt sought with Fox and the impending standoff between McCourt and Bud Selig.
Everyone knows this is a difficult time for McCourt and the Dodgers. Everyone knows that the money is tight and the options few. Moreover, everyone -- at least everyone with a lick of sense or intellectual honesty about them -- knows how McCourt and the Dodgers got into this mess.
Mr. Sacks and Frank McCourt, however, are choosing to ignore that. They are choosing to eschew any sense of humility and any notion of responsibility and to put their absolute worst foot forward. From Shaikin’s report:“Bob Sacks, the attorney, also said McCourt would not surrender control of Dodger Stadium, the surrounding land and some ticket revenues even if he loses ownership of the Dodgers. Sacks said the entities controlling those interests are separate from the Dodgers and would remain under McCourt’s control, which would require any new owner to pay tens of millions in revenue each year to McCourt.
“‘There is the possibility of some fairly acrimonious and extreme litigation going forward, which Frank is hopeful will not occur. If baseball were to act precipitously against Frank, which has been threatened, then there will be a showdown on that issue.’”
“Acrimonious and extreme litigation.” It’s a phrase so ridiculous, oblivious, irresponsible and frankly obnoxious in this context that I don’t even have the stomach to make the easy jokes at Mr. Sacks’ expense. As a lawyer I’m disgusted by this kind of threat. It casts what, on some level, I still consider my profession in the worst light. It justifies the low esteem in which so many people hold the practice of law.
As a baseball fan I’m disgusted by Frank McCourt’s entire operation and everything he’s done to this point, and my disgust grows by the day. Here’s a man who bought this once proud franchise on the back of $421 million of debt and managed to turn it into something even less than the funny paper he threw at it. He carved it up, mortgaged it to the gills, looted whatever he could loot and shifted around whatever he couldn’t. He lived a billionaire’s lifestyle on millionaire money that wasn’t even his to begin with and since it became abundantly clear that such a state of affairs was unsustainable, he has borrowed more and cast about madly to salvage whatever he can. At least as long as he hasn’t had to make any sacrifices himself, anyway.
And now, when he is finally being called to task over his irresponsible spendthrift ways, he has the audacity to threaten to scorch the earth with “acrimonious and extreme litigation,” all the while continuing to hold the Dodgers hostage, be it to some sort of injunction that keeps the team his for the time being (my guess) or via a gussied up extortion scheme in which he holds his control over the parking lots, the ballpark and whatever other ancillary assets to which he lays claim over the head of Major League Baseball and whoever it may get to run the Dodgers once McCourt’s slimy fingers are pried away from the controls.
Of course, Frank McCourt is a free actor with free will and such a course of action is his right. It is a course of action that was even enabled to a degree by Major League Baseball, who neglected to properly assess the risks of allowing such a leveraged transaction to such a questionable figure. And while I believe McCourt will ultimately lose, there is nothing to stop him from choosing to fight this fight with every weapon at his disposal, and I don’t doubt Mr. Sacks when he says such a fight will be “acrimonious and extreme.”
But just because one can pursue a course of action doesn’t mean one should. Frank McCourt could, if he so chooses, stand down, admit that he has reached an untenable position as the Dodgers’ owner, allow Major League Baseball to take the team over and then collect his profits -- of which there likely will still be a considerable amount -- when the team is ultimately sold. By doing so he will be paying a price for his incompetence and avarice, but it will be a relatively small one given the sheer scope of his incompetence and avarice. And of course there would be a psychic benefit too, as by doing so he would limit the the pain felt by millions of Dodgers fans who have had to live through the nightmare he has created these past few years.
But I highly doubt McCourt will do any of that. He won’t because he lives in a world of zero responsibility, zero accountability and he has absolutely no shame. He is no idiot. He knows what he has done to this franchise. He knows that, at this point, saving himself and saving the Los Angeles Dodgers are two different things entirely. He just doesn’t care. He doesn’t care and he doesn’t -- as is clearly evidenced by his actions to date and the stated intentions of his attorney -- have any intention of pursuing a course that places the best interests of the Dodgers and the interests of Dodgers fans anywhere on the priority list.
So bring your acrimonious and extreme litigation, Frank. Do your absolute worst. No sense in trying to do something decent for once in your reign as Dodgers’ owner. At this point, why should you change? And how could you do it anyway, given how little capacity for prudence, reflection and contrition you’ve exhibited thus far?