Report: Tim Wallach a candidate in Toronto.

Always a candidate, never a manager, Dodgers third base coach Tim Wallach’s name has surfaced in another report over a managerial vacancy. Bob Elliott of the Toronto Sun wrote on his Twitter account that Wallach will interview for the Blue Jays’ vacant manager position.

Wallach recently interviewed for the Boston Red Sox manager’s job, which ultimately went to incumbent Toronto manager John Farrell. That opened yet another vacancy in Toronto.

There’s an interesting wrinkle to the Wallach-Toronto courtship. Wallach wasn’t interviewed two years ago when the Blue Jays needed to hire a replacement for Cito Gaston (the job that ultimately went to Farrell) but Mike Cormack of Sportsnet.ca reports that we shouldn’t look too much into that:

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Welcome back. We’re feeling pretty.

I clicked on insidesocal.com/dodgers yesterday and the first thing I saw was a picture of a tree branch. It looked like it belonged to a cherry blossom tree, but I couldn’t be sure. After hitting “refresh,” that pretty branch became a rocky coastline, then a designer chess set, then a boutique hotel in Lisbon, Portugal.

Ah, clip art. No baseball blog has ever looked prettier.

I asked my editor and he said the clip art would be gone soon, replaced with something more germane to baseball or the Dodgers. (What, so soon?)

Anyways, I’ll be back blogging soon. Enjoy Game 3 of the World Series tonight and, if you’re feeling pretty, go hit “refresh” a couple more times.

Gerry Hunsicker, ex-Astros GM, joins Dodgers front office.

The Dodgers hired Gerry Hunsicker as Senior Advisor, Baseball Operations on Thursday, adding another veteran baseball mind to their growing front office.

According to the team’s official announcement, Hunsicker will “assist GM Ned Colletti and President and CEO Stan Kasten with the Dodgers’ big league club while also lending his expertise to international scouting and development, pro scouting and minor league development.”
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Dodgers to reassign batting coach Dave Hansen.

Batting coach Dave Hansen is the only member of the Dodgers’ coaching staff who will not return to his current position in 2013, the team announced Friday. The 43-year-old has been offered another position within the organization.

Hansen was named interim hitting coach in July 2011 after Jeff Pentland was fired at midseason, and had the ‘interim’ tag removed prior to the 2012 season.

As a team, the Dodgers ranked near the bottom of the 16-team National League in many key categories — runs (13th), slugging percentage (15th), home runs (15th). They ranked first in sacrifice hits, with 82, but that was often attributed to their inability to advance runners with base hits.

The returning coaches include pitching coach Rick Honeycutt, first base coach Davey Lopes, third base coach Tim Wallach, bench coach Trey Hillman, bullpen coach Ken Howell, catching coach Steve Yeager, bullpen catcher Rob Flippo, as well as Manny Mota and Mickey Hatcher. Wallach is a candidate for the Boston Red Sox manager’s job. If hired, he would leave the Dodgers with two coaching vacancies to fill this winter.

Hatcher, 57, was the Angels’ hitting coach from 2000 until he was fired in May. He joined the Dodgers as a special assistant to the general manager but quickly became an in-uniform coach.