Andruw Jones

Happy New Year -- indeed! I'm hearing the Dodgers are working on a deal that will allow the team to cut ties with Andruw Jones, save $12 million and give last year's free-agent bust the opportunity to seek employment elsewhere. The Dodgers still hold out hope they can save the money and trade Jones, but the end result will be Jones probably won't be swinging and missing in L.A. this season.

Andruw Jones and the Dodgers? One and done. The Dodgers have agreed to trade or release Jones in exchange for his deferring much of the $22 million remaining on his contract, a baseball source said Friday. The deal is expected to shave $12 million from the Dodgers' 2009 payroll and cut Jones' salary next season to about $5 million. If the Dodgers cannot trade him, even at that discounted salary, then Jones can ask for his release before spring training, the source said.

"Are you saying you're sorry?" I'm standing in a spacious Texas Rangers clubhouse, on a gorgeous spring morning, speaking to a trim and talkative Andruw Jones. His legs are back. His smile is back. Even his -- gasp -- swing might be back. Later this day at Surprise Stadium, he will stroke through a fastball from new Dodger Claudio Vargas, driving it off the left-field bullpen roof for his first home run of the spring. A nasty bite of the hand that still feeds him $22 million.

Sitting at his corner locker in the Texas Rangers' clubhouse Friday, Andruw Jones said the main reason he asked the Dodgers to release him this winter wasn't his desire for a change of scenery. He said he asked out mainly because of the way he was treated by Dodgers owner Frank McCourt. "He wasn't standing behind me, I think," Jones said, adding that if McCourt had shown him more respect, "I almost definitely would be part of the L.A. Dodgers right now." McCourt was unavailable for comment.

In the hallway outside the Dodgers' clubhouse, you can buy a special Manny Ramirez T-shirt for $30. The blue shirt features a picture of Ramirez in the middle of his swing, surrounded by these words: "Manny, Take Us to the Promised Land." Ramirez walked through the clubhouse Sunday morning, stopping to ask me a couple of questions. Hey, what's my batting average? It's .290. That's OK. How many home runs? You hit 19. Pretty good, right? Not really.

Kurt Streeter's tale of the downtrodden Baron Davis should be a lesson for all naive sports team owners and marketers: "Past performance does not guarantee future results." Add Davis to the Overpaid-Underachievers Club. Now that I think of it, his name would look appropriate next to that of Andruw Jones and David Beckham. Lawrence Kates Los Angeles

Downey's California: Do teenagers read the sports page? I hope so, because hey, young people rule. They have taken over Planet Sports. Athletes in their teens, or barely out, have begun to dominate professional athletics, making me feel more and more like an old . . . uh, fossil. Go watch a World Series game and the hero is Andruw Jones, all of 19. Go watch an NBA game and see Kobe Bryant, who just turned 18, driving on Kevin Garnett, freshly 20.

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. -- It's the oddest sight in camp. It's the loudest whisper in camp. People are staring, people are talking, everybody is wondering, there's no way around it. Literally, no way around it. Andruw Jones looks heavy. The newest Dodgers center fielder looks like the newest Dodgers wrestler. He stalks up to home plate in his Dodgers whites and you're like, this is him? This is the sleek center fielder who has won 10 consecutive Gold Gloves?