Next year the Dodgers will try to become the first National League team to win three consecutive World Series<\/a>. The Angels will try to end baseball\u2019s longest postseason drought<\/a> at 11 years, still without much of a plan beyond rushing first-round draft picks to the major leagues while treading the financial waters until Anthony Rendon\u2019s contract runs out.<\/p>\n On Sunday they missed out on Japanese slugger Munetaka Murakami<\/a>, who signed with the 102-loss Chicago White Sox. Of the Angels\u2019 five acquisitions this winter, three did not play in the majors last season, and not because they are up-and-coming prospects.<\/p>\n If you\u2019re an Angels fan and you\u2019re sick and tired of this, should you reconsider your loyalty?<\/p>\n Jim Bowden believes you should.<\/p>\n Bowden, formerly the general manager of the Cincinnati Reds and Washington Nationals, serves as a baseball insider on several media platforms. On \u201cFoul Territory\u201d last week he suggested<\/a> fans of small-market teams have an option that might be more constructive than getting angry.<\/p>\n In Pittsburgh, for instance, the owner would rather complain about the lack of a salary cap than spend enough money to build a winner around generational pitcher Paul Skenes.<\/p>\n \u201cYou don\u2019t have to be a Pirate fan,\u201d Bowden said. \u201cYou can retire as a Pirate fan, or trade yourself to the Dodgers.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you want to see your team win, right now the Dodgers have got the best chance to win a World Series again. As a fan, you can root for any team you want.<\/p>\n \u201cYou don\u2019t have to root for the team in your home city. You can see the Dodgers play in your home city. They\u2019ll come into Pittsburgh and beat you.<\/p>\n \u201cIf it bothers you that much, just become a Dodger fan. It\u2019s fine.\u201d<\/p>\n Dodgers pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto celebrates with teammates, coaches and owners after the Dodgers\u2019 World Series victory over the Toronto Blue Jays on Nov. 1.<\/p>\n (Robert Gauthier\/Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n The Angels no longer operate as a large-market team<\/a>, and their circumstances could get even more dire in the near future.<\/p>\n On Sunday, Sports Business Journal reported that the parent company of FanDuel Sports Network is in jeopardy of shutting down<\/a> if it cannot complete a sale to streaming service DAZN. The Angels would not disappear from your screens and streams, but it likely would mean the Angels would take a big cut in local broadcast revenue for a second consecutive year.<\/p>\n The Dodgers\u2019 bandwagon shows no sign of slowing. The Dodgers set a franchise attendance record<\/a> last season. They offer stadium tours<\/a> in English, Spanish and Japanese. They launched a fan club in Japan<\/a>.<\/p>\n So, as a frustrated Angels fan, you could hop on that bandwagon. Or you could try another large-market team \u2014 say, the New York Mets.<\/p>\n Mets owner Steve Cohen is worth $23 billion<\/a>, according to Forbes. When Cohen bought the Mets in 2020, he said this: \u201cIf I don\u2019t win a World Series in the next three to five years<\/a> \u2014 I\u2019d like to make it sooner \u2014 I would consider that slightly disappointing.\u201d<\/p>\n The Mets still have not won a World Series since 1986. On Friday he took to social media to criticize \u201cthe usual idiots<\/a> misinterpreting a Post article on Mets payroll.\u201d<\/p>\n On Sunday, given the Mets\u2019 losses of D\u00edaz and beloved slugger Pete Alonso in free agency, New York Post columnist Mike Vaccaro shot back, comparing Cohen to greatly unloved former owner Fred Wilpon in this adaptation of a Christmas carol: \u201cSteve\u2019s beginning to look a lot like Wilpon\/Mets fans say \u2018Hell, no!\u2019\/What\u2019s the point in being so rich\/And a ruthless sonofabitch\/If you don\u2019t spend dough?\u201d<\/p>\n The concept of fan free agency \u2014 essentially what Bowden suggested \u2014 is not new. Every now and then some disgruntled fan will publicly disown his favorite team, then invite rival teams to suggest why he should support them. If you\u2019re creative enough, rival teams will send you some free swag.<\/p>\n That level of desperation is what many Dodgers fans felt a decade and a half ago, when former owner Frank McCourt needed a loan to cover payroll<\/a>, hired a Russian physicist who channeled positive energy<\/a> toward the team and \u201cdiagnosed the disconnects\u201d among baseball operations personnel, and disparaged as \u201cun-American\u201d<\/a> the league\u2019s refusal to approve a television contract that he said would have provided the revenue to keep the Dodgers out of bankruptcy court.<\/p>\n Fans wearing Shohei Ohtani Dodgers jerseys wait to enter Angel Stadium before a game between the Angels and Dodgers on Aug. 12.<\/p>\n (Luke Hales \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n In 2011, the year McCourt took the team into bankruptcy, the Angels outdrew the Dodgers<\/a> for the only time. The Dodgers fans did not bail on their team. They waited for better days.<\/p>\n That is where Angels fans are now \u2014 and, for that matter, where Pirates fans are too. Bowden\u2019s suggestion that unhappy Pirates fans exhausted by the perennial futility try the Dodgers did not go over well in Pittsburgh. At the Pirates\u2019 fan site Rum Bunter, Emma Lingan wrote<\/a>: \u201cFandom isn\u2019t a streaming subscription you cancel when the content gets bad.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n
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