Dodger Fans Try Not to Get Too Blue Over Strike

The Meaghers, fearful that this was the end, came to Dodger Stadium on Thursday from Fresno. Sister Teresa Anne and Sister Bertilla, sensing that this might be their last chance to see their beloved boys in blue, came weeks before Nuns Night. And 71-year-old Betty Zaby, a fan since the Dodgers moved to Los Angeles, came to savor every last minute of a season that could be cut short.

“It’s like the end of the world,” said Zaby, as she headed to her field level box seat to watch the Dodgers battle the San Diego Padres in the final game of the current home stand--and what some feared might be the last game of the 1994 season at Dodger Stadium.

With the players union threatening to strike next Friday, labor troubles cast a pall over the afternoon game.

There wasn’t much sympathy for either side of the dispute.

“Who do you root for? Million-dollar owners or million-dollar players?” asked Steve Spalsbury, 33, who drove with his 8-year-old son Marc from San Diego to watch the game. “It’s like, Beavis or Butt-head?”

Flanked in his sales booth by Dodger T-shirts, buttons and banners, concessionaire Dennis Hussey was not very pleased with his hometown team. “I don’t have any money coming from anywhere else,” he said, “and it’s nice that they want a million dollars, but they should realize there are lots of people who depend on them.” Hussey and most other vendors and stadium employees would be out of work during a strike.

One stadium hand said he will miss the work more than the money. “It is so much fun out here,” said John W. Thompson, who has run elevators at Dodger Stadium for 18 years but also works as a mechanic for the Los Angeles Police Department. “This is the most beautiful park in the world.”

Thompson, 54, remembers sitting idle during the 1981 strike, which ran 49 days. “I hated it,” he said. But he is trying to remain philosophical: “This is a part of life, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

The possibility of a strike has been looming all season because the players and owners are operating without a contract. Both groups agreed to start the season while a new contract was being worked on. However, the sides are polarized on the issues of a proposed salary cap and arbitration.

The players union explored the idea with its players of going on strike after Thursday’s game but chose to keep the previously announced Aug. 12 strike date.

Phil LaBarre said his family dreaded the thought of a strike, in part because his children are on a mission to collect Dodger autographs. Before the game, which the Dodgers won 1-0 before 45,000 fans, Shawn, 10, and Ashley, 7, snagged batting coach Manny Mota. He added his signatures to baseballs bearing the autographs of Raul Mondesi, Tommy Lasorda and Brett Butler, among others.

“The kids are suffering more than anyone,” LaBarre said. “When you come to a game and see it in person, talk to the players . . . win or lose, my kids are still happy to go to a game. And we’re not going to get that now.”

Dodger baseball has been the game of choice in the Meagher household for generations. Cindy and Vince Meagher and their 12-year-old son Doug are making a tour of Southern California ballparks to get in as much live baseball as possible before a strike hits. Thursday they were at Dodger Stadium; Friday they’ll be in Anaheim to watch the Angels.

“I’m going to be bored the rest of the summer,” said Doug, a catcher in a Fresno Little League.

In the upper deck, two nuns were waiting for the game to start, Dodger visors in place on their wimples, blue trim bedecking their white habits.

“I made sure to get this ticket,” said Sister Teresa Anne of Nazareth House on the Westside. She hopes that the Dodgers will win it all this year--”for all the praying we’ve been doing, they should.”

Sister Teresa and fellow convent member Sister Bertilla bemoaned the possibility of a strike.

“It takes away from the sportsmanship,” Sister Teresa said. “It loses the season for everyone.”

Some fans said they could live with a strike.

“It’ll be good for all the first place teams, because they’ll go straight to the playoffs,” said Johnny Vorburger, 10, as he sat with other youths from a Santa Monica day camp. Conveniently, the Dodgers are first in the National League West.

Would a guaranteed first place finish really be worth a strike? “Nah, I’d like to see the whole season,” Johnny said.

Sitting in his left field box seat wearing a Dodger jersey, Pete Ortiz was drinking up the atmosphere. The Riverside County sheriff’s deputy made a point of picking up tickets for this game, knowing that the season’s days may be numbered.

But he said the end of baseball won’t be the end of the world. “I’m a big Dodger fan, driving here for two hours,” said Ortiz, 28. “But you just have to roll with it. I love baseball, but there’s a lot more important things in life I can get upset over.”

Elsewhere, baseball fans protested the threatened strike.

In Arlington, Tex., about 500 fans left their seats in the top of the third inning of the game between the Chicago White Sox and Texas Rangers. But most who left their seats after the first pitch of the third inning returned for the bottom of the inning. Few fans left the stadium.

In Kansas City, two young men at the Royals-Oakland A’s game drew applause when they carried a big sign that read: “Fans Say One More Strike & We’re Out!”

* NEGOTIATIONS CONTINUE: Players decide against striking before Aug. 12. C1