Are Dodgers Fiscally Fit or Foolish?

VERO BEACH, Fla. —  Forget the chicken and egg. There is no question what comes first in baseball.

It’s this simple: There is no hope if you don’t pay for it, no championship without a checkbook.

The playoff history of the mid- and late ‘90s documents that only the rich and famous survive to play in October. A large payroll doesn’t guarantee success, but there is no success without a large payroll. The San Diego Padres, at a mere $50 million last year, were almost an anomaly.

Did the Dodgers and their new ownership create a system in which spring training is no longer synonymous with hope, in which the revenue, payroll and competitive imbalance has left two-thirds of the teams without a realistic playoff chance even before the first wind sprints of February?

No, but they are being castigated for inflaming it.

Sandy Alderson, baseball’s executive vice president, called the $105-million signing of Kevin Brown an affront to the commissioner’s office. The beat continued at a January owners’ meeting. Padre President Larry Lucchino said the $105-million commitment to a pitcher was symbolic of the industry’s problems, and San Francisco Giant managing partner Peter Magowan considered the Dodgers’ $80-million-plus payroll and said the Fox leadership had “misled everybody in baseball.”

“I feel somewhat stabbed in the back by what they told us [while waiting to be approved as the club’s new owner] and what they’re doing,” Magowan said. “They assured us that they’d remain fiscally responsible, as Peter O’Malley had been. It was a total misrepresentation.”

As Brown put the green in his wallet and donned the blue for the first time Friday, Fox executive Peter Chernin, speaking to The Times from Los Angeles, said all the complaints smack of payroll envy.

“We’re a pretty easy target,” said Chernin, president and co-chief operating officer of News Corp., and chairman and chief executive of the Fox Group. “You know, the big bad media company. Guys in suits. [But] I don’t think anybody can look at it and say we’re trying to do anything other than build a winning team.

“I mean, Peter O’Malley sold the team because I think he felt it was important to have a different economic base to be competitive. He was very clear when we were going through the process that there was stuff that would have to be done to [improve] the team, and there was not a single change made last year without input from Peter.”

Chernin called the attacks “sour grapes and devoid of credence . . . absolutely unfair.”

“We arguably did the most dramatic thing to try and hold the line early [last] season with the Mike Piazza deal,” he said. “We stood up and didn’t break at making what would have been a real expensive deal and got no credit for it.

“The only representation we had made was that we intended to run this team for a profit and we intend to do that. We may have the dubious distinction for having the highest-priced player, but I bet anything that a year from now that crown won’t be ours. I mean, we made the one deal and you would think we’ve destroyed the salary structure and have a payroll 30% higher than the next team.

“It would be a lot easier for [people] to make those comments if we had the highest payroll in baseball, but we’re not going to have anything close to the highest.”

Chernin may know something no one else does.

The Dodger payroll will be close to the highest, no matter how the accounting is done. It has gone from $48 million at the start of last year to $84 million--the trade of Piazza and acquisition of Gary Sheffield, some would argue, partially triggering the escalation.

The New York Yankees, with the acquisition of Roger Clemens and arbitration in favor of Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera last week, have moved past the Dodgers at a record $86.1 million.

If Kevin Malone is able to trade Jose Vizcaino and Dave Mlicki, the Dodger payroll will drop to $79 million, but the top half-dozen teams aren’t going to be separated by much more than the signing of one utility infielder.

Fox didn’t buy a gem. One club official said the new ownership might have been better off starting with an expansion team and building from scratch, rather than taking a team that required dismantling in some areas and rebuilding in others, a team unable to recycle the payroll and roster from within because of a comparatively barren farm system.

Chernin acknowledged that the Dodgers are a “couple years away” from being able to mix in a core group of young players, but he made no excuses, no apologies.

“There’s some obvious issues with the sport in terms of cost, but I don’t think we’ve been the one to drive those costs up, and I don’t think long-term we’ll be the one,” he said. “We’re doing everything we can to build a profitable enterprise [including renovations at Dodger Stadium and a possible move to Arizona for spring training] and every bit of analysis we’ve done is that the key to being profitable is that you’d better have a winning team. As for everybody getting on us . . . well, it comes with the territory.”

It’s a territory these new Dodgers are comfortable with. They are as much about finding a lost swagger as they are about preparing physically for the opener April 5. They are feeding off the complaints, begging to be hated.

Malone, the self-described new sheriff of the National League West, seldom misses an opportunity to bite back, laying out an optimistic--and sometimes outrageous--litany that fills notebooks and fuels the fire.

Friday, for instance, he said of signing Brown: “We had a tough choice to make. Kevin Brown or Garth Brooks? Garth Brooks or Kevin Brown? We went with Kevin Brown and the Padres went with Garth Brooks.”

He also mentioned the Yankees’ acquisition of Clemens, saying, “I have to tip my cap to the Yankees. They took a championship club and made it better. That’s hard to do. Of course, they’re going to need Roger Clemens when they play us in the Fall Classic.”

On a roll, he added, “We haven’t made a lot of friends during the off-season and we’re going to have to step it up a notch on the field. We know who are enemies are, but I didn’t know there were that many envious people. When you’re trying to accomplish something positive and people are trying to pull you down, it’s often because they’re trying to hide their own inefficiency. I mean, what people use as economic disparity is an easy excuse. There’s a lot more to it than resources. A lot of the time it comes down to good and bad decisions.”

For the Dodgers, it might come down to infield defense, left-handed relief, Todd Hundley’s physical condition and the productivity--and behavior--of Sheffield and Raul Mondesi. One thing is certain: They are going to have to live with the slings and arrows.

As well as the expectations that come with an $80-million payroll.