Dodgers’ financial crookedness may be just the gift SF Giants need at the end of a brutal season

It’s been a tough year for the SF Giant both on and off the field, but maybe all of this pain and suffering will sting a little less if the Los Angeles Dodgers get some sort of comeuppance which seems possible based on recent reporting about owner Mark Walter’s alleged financial misdeeds.

Walter has been under investigation by the Department of Justice for life insurance companies he owns which apparently aren’t being run entirely above board. If this is true, it helps explain his hasty sale of the Los Angeles Lakers to Bob Iger and Josh Kushner in an attempt to get more capital and try to make all the money add up.

It’s a very complex situation that is difficult to fully grasp, although our friends at Dodgers Way did a great job breaking it down, but apparently Walter also reportedly attempted to cash out Dodgers’ TV deal in a desperate effort to get some more cash.

The whole thing just reeks of crookedness and deception and if it’s all true it proves that the Dodgers were not able to turn themselves into a juggernaut because they were smarter than everyone else, but because they played fast and loose with the rules and promised money they didn’t really have.

That’s pretty shady stuff and what it means going forward for both the Dodgers and MLB with a lockout looming is unclear, but it would be great to see the Dodgers get punished for their shady operations.

Really, their whole enterprise now seems analogous to LIV Golf in some ways for any golf fans out there. A lot of the money and deals that were promised to golfers who left the PGA Tour for LIV seemed outlandish at the time and there was a sense that Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund had limitless wealth but now that they pulled their funding LIV seems to be on life support.

The two situations aren’t exactly the same, but when it seems impossible that an entity can or will just spend money indefinitely it probably means that there’s something else going on that isn’t quite up to snuff or is not sustainable.

How will financial probes affect the Dodgers going forward?

Will the Dodgers get away with all of this and probably win another World Series? That seems quite possible even if they’ve struggled as of late. It may be premature to predict the downfall of the organization but at least we can delight in the fact that financial impropriety may leave a stain upon the supposed “dynasty” that the Dodgers have built since Walter’s ownership group purchased the team in 2012.

Will fans care about this even though it’s complex and most will just tune it out? Yes, but it will probably be a situation more akin to the Houston Astros sign stealing scandal where fans get really upset for a year or two but then it just kind of goes away. It’s also not quite the same because instead of players cheating, this has more to do with an ownership group that didn’t play by the rules.

Still, there could be big implications for the Dodgers. Shohei Ohtani has a clause in his contract where he can opt out if the team is sold which Walter may be forced to do depending on how bad things get for him financially.

Reports suggest Ohtani does not plan to exercise that clause but if these investigations turn up more bad things for Walter and he has to sell the team then maybe there will at least be a little uncertainty around the Dodgers going forward and their ability to seemingly sign every big free agent and spend and defer money infinitely.

Add us as a preferred source on Google

Follow