LOS ANGELES — Among the most inane “the Dodgers are buying the world series” rants came a couple of days ago from none other than former NFL-er Jason Kelce (you know, the one who’s not marrying Taylor Swift). The veteran of 13 campaigns as center for the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles had some choice words for the Dodgers, and baseball in general on the podcast that he shares with his brother. To his credit, Mr. Swift defended the World Series as “awesome,” to which Jason Kelce had the folowing retort: “So you’re telling me I’m supposed to get excited about a Canadian baseball team and a team that just spends more money than everyone else?…. That’s why baseball sucks! You just buy World Series championships. It’s the dumbest thing in the world.”
Travis Kelce tried to pull his brother off the ledge, saying he was enjoying the series. “It was exciting.”
That didn’t go over well with Jason. “It’s exciting?” he scoffed. “It’s exciting that the team that spent the most money and everybody knew was going to win the World Series won the World Series? Everybody knew this was going to happen before the season!! So no, baseball’s not getting my stamp.”
Of course, this is just simply the latest iteration of dead-brained criticism that the Dodgers have had to endure since Freddie Freeman squeezed that double play ball for the last out of the ninth inning in game seven. And if it weren’t for the source, we’d probably just let it pass. But now that it’s in the ether, it needs to be addressed.
Fear not, Dodger faithful, team president Stan Kasten has your back. On baseball insider Jayson Stark’s podcast, Kasten gave the retired Eagles center a piece of his mind.
After being read the Kelce quote, Kasten said, “History demonstrates that’s not true. Because usually the team with the highest payroll doesn’t win the World Series. So I hate to throw facts at him, but I will throw one quote from someone in his city. And that’s [the Phillies’] Bryce Harper who said, ‘the only people complaining are losers’ I think he’s exactly right.”
Shots fired! Kasten went on to say, “What got us to the position we’re in was–yes, we had a high payroll, but those people need to be led and developed, and need to be backed up by a farm system that is productive year in, year out. Without that, we couldn’t compete and just buy a World Championship. If it were true, more teams would be trying that approach, it’s not true.”
One of these days, we’ll have to give you some talking points to combat this tired narrative, but for now Kasten’s remarks are a pretty good start. Thanks Stan. And Jason, maybe stick to the pigskin, mmmmkay?
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