Don Mattingly will be returning for his third season at the helm for the Dodgers. In his two seasons as Manager, he has a 168-155 record with

No more TOOTBLANS Davey! Photo: Howard Smith-US PRESSWIRE

a .520 W-L%.Chuck Crim has been promoted to bullpen coach in this his seventh season in the Dodgers organization. He was an amateur scout for the Dodgers from 2007-2008, the pitching coach for the Rookie-Advanced Ogden Raptors in 2009, pitching coach for the Single-A Great Lakes Loons in 2010, and the pitching coach for the AA-Chattanooga Lookouts from 2011-2012. Crim, who deservedly has worked up through the ranks of the Dodger organization is a native of Southern California and is from Van Nuys. He also was the head baseball coach at Canyon High School in Santa Clarita, California from 2003-2005. He will be replacing Ken Howell, who was promoted from the bullpen coach role.

Trey Hillman will be returning for his third season as bench coach. Hillman also has extensive managing experience including three years with the Kansas City Royals, five seasons in Japan, and 12 years managing in the minors. If you remember, Hillman filled in admirably when Don Mattingly was suspended for a couple of games this past season.

Rick Honeycutt will be returning for his eighth season as the Dodgers’ pitching coach. He is the longest-tenured coach on the Dodger staff. Honeycutt has helped shape a formidable Dodger pitching staff over his eight consecutive seasons with the ball club. The Dodger pitchers have posted a Major League Baseball best 3.77 ERA, second in strikeouts with 8,544, and second in opponents’ batting average with .248.

Trey Hillman is Donnie’s right-hand man. Photo: Howard Smith-US PRESSWIRE

Davey Lopes will enter his third season as the Dodgers’ first base coach. Although the Dodgers made strides in base running in 2011, this past season saw a setback in the base running department. I’m not sure how many of the costly TOOTBLANS and base running mistakes were partly Lopes’ fault or perhaps because Matt Kemp‘s injuries prevented him from running as much, yet the Dodgers need to try to go back to 2011 form. Regardless, former Dodger Davey Lopes will be holding his signature stopwatch at first base once again for the Dodgers next season.

Mark McGwireis the only new addition to the coaching staff from outside of the organization. Dave

Mark McGwire was an extremely successful hitting coach in St. Louis, and now he’ll join the Dodger staff in 2013. Photo: Joy R. Absalon-US PRESSWIRE

Hansen was let go earlier this offseason, and he has since been hired as hitting coach for the Seattle Mariners. Big Mac was a very successful hitting coach for the St. Louis Cardinals for the past three seasons. During his time with the Red Birds, they led the NL in batting average (.269), on-base percentage (.337) and batting average with runners in scoring position (.274), ranked second in runs (2,263), fourth in slugging percentage (.416) and third in OPS (.753). Wow, not too shabby! The Cards also won a World Series crown in 2011. McGwire hit 583 homeruns in his 16-year career which is the 10th most in MLB history. I can’t wait to see what McGwire can do with the Dodger hitters. He has already spoke of the psychological aspects of hitting, and he plans to evaluate the players to see where they stand.

Tim Wallach will return for this third season as third base coach. Wallach was looking and interviewing for manager jobs this offseason, but he failed to land one just yet. He previously was a very successful manager for the Triple-A Albuquerque Isotopes for four seasons. The former Dodger understandably would like to manage in the big league level one day. Many thought he deserved a chance to manage the Dodgers after Joe Torre retired.

Ken Howell was promoted from bullpen coach to assistant pitching coach. He was the bullpen coach from 2008-2012. During that time, the Dodger relievers had a 3.49 ERA which was third-best in the league. The former Dodger pitcher will now assist both Honeycutt and Crim as well as working with the minor league pitching staffs and with pitchers who are on rehab assignments throughout the season.

John Valentin was promoted to the position of assistant hitting coach. From 2011-2012, Valentin was the hitting coach for the Isotopes.

Tim Wallch wants to manage, but in the meantime he’s back as the Dodgers’ third base coach. Photo: Jennifer Hilderbrand-US PRESSWIRE

He previously was the hitting coach for AA-Chattanooga in 2010, the manager for the Lookouts in 2009, and the manager of Single-A Inland Empire in 2008.

Manny Mota will return for his 34th season as a Dodger coach and his 44th year in the organization.

Steve Yeager will return for his second year as a catching coach for the Dodgers. He will be helping to instruct the minor league catchers throughout the season as well.

With such a strong coaching staff, especially with the addition of Mark McGwire, the Dodger coaches will have the totality of Spring Training to work with this roster. It was thought that the large turnover of players during the last half of the season didn’t allow for the team to gel enough to be a cohesive team unit. Now we will see if this instructional staff can mold this star-studded team into a championship caliber squad.

Who would you ratehr see at third base? Wallach? Or Uribe? I think we all know the answer here.

Tim Wallach played 2,054 games at third base, during his 16 year major league career. He had a career .257 batting average, and hit 260 home runs. Wallach was a five time all-star, and won three gold gloves. The good news about this is that he doesn’t have to go far. It’s only a few feet from the third base coaching box, to third base. Just activate him and toss him a glove. He walks three feet over to the hot corner, and there we go, problem solved. I think we all know even now, during his golden years, he can’t do any worse than Juan Uribe.

Hansen is ready to play, put him in skip!-Jake Roth-US PRESSWIRE

Another option at third base is hitting coach Dave Hansen. Our hitting coach played fifteen seasons, and 371 games at third base. He had a career .260 batting average, a .360 on-base percentage, and hit 35 home runs. Hey that’s 30 more than Uribe has hit in his entire time with the Dodgers. He can serve as Wallach’s backup on the bench, and he can also play first base as well. He also hit 15 pinch-hit home runs, so he would be a decent option off the bench.

As for first base, well that is an easy choice. Our very own manager Don Mattingly, will need to activate himself as a player/manager and put himself in the lineup at first base. He could bat behind Matt Kemp and Andre Ethier providing much needed lineup protection. Mattingly was a terrific player. He played 1,634 games at first base, and won nine gold gloves in 14 seasons. He was a six time all-star, and won three silver slugger awards. Donnie Baseball collected 2, 153 hits, batted .307 with as .358 OBP. And hit 222 home runs. He won one MVP award, and he even played three games at third base. Yes in a pinch, he could play the hot corner. The great thing about this, is that while acting as a player/manager, Donnie can bunt until his heart’s content. This would also kill two birds with one stone, as he would be showing all of the other players, the correct way to bunt.

Donnie can always double switch himself into the game- Kelley L Cox-US PRESSWIRE

Now for left field, we need a little help, too and we could call upon our new assistant to player development, and General Manager, Mickey Hatcher. Hatch played 346 games in the outfield over the course of his 11 year career. Hatch played 346 games at left field, and also played 149 games at first base, and 125 games at third base. He can play all over the diamond. As a hitter he was not bad at all, with a .280 career batting average, and 38 home runs. Even our coaches have out-hit Juan Uribe.

Now for the bench, we can activate the legendary Manny Mota. The pinch-hitter extraordinaire, was a career .300 hitter off the bench, with a .373 OBP, and 149 pinch-hits, which was a Dodger record for years. Mota played 20 years in the bigs, and 12 with the Dodgers. Actually if you remember, Mota was a player/coach for the last couple of seasons. The Dodgers actually activated him as a player in 1980 for the stretch drive. He was primarily an outfielder when he did play, but you know, he did play 15 games at third base.  I would rather have Manny Mota at age 74 play third base than Juan Uribe.

Who would you rather have come off the bench? Mota, or Kennedy? Think about it- Kirby Lee/Image of Sport-US PRESSWIRE

Can you imagine how far ahead in the standings the Dodgers would be if they had this kind of production from third base, first base, left field, and the bench? We would be running away from the division. Sometimes you just gotta look in unorthodox places for solutions.

How might the lineup look? Let’s take a look.

Well there you have it. Mota can come off the bench, and play occasionally in left field. Still an improvement over Juan Rivera right? LOL ok ok. You probably think I have been sniffing the glue a little too much. The sad part about this is it’s actually true. The coaches, and Mattingly are more of an offensive threat, than Juan Uribe, James Loney, and Juan Rivera. there is more talent on the coaching staff then on the bench. I guess I am just dreaming of a day when the Dodger’s corner infielders and left fielders are actually ya know, productive. I know, I know, such an amazing concept! Production! Anyhoo, that’s about all Dodger fans. Enjoy the day off, and we now return to our regularly scheduled Dodger trade rumors.