Dombrowski Could Stay With Marlins

ST. LOUIS â€”  General Manager Dave Dombrowski of the Florida Marlins, still the front-runner for the Dodger position, will be among four people brought back for a second round of interviews this week, but the growing possibility that the Marlins will be sold soon and the continuing possibility that Dombrowski will be getting job offers from the Colorado Rockies and Arizona Diamondbacks may complicate his decision.

Marlin owner Wayne Huizenga is believed to have dropped his sale price from $165 million to about $150 million, prompting serious negotiations with John Henry, a Boca Raton commodities broker who has said he would open his wallet to make the Marlins competitive again and would like to keep Dombrowski as president or general manager, whichever Dombrowski prefers.

Huizenga has also apparently dropped his demand that Marlin games be televised on his SportsChannel Florida until 2024. Huizenga is trying to sell the cable station to New York cable mogul Charles Dolan and had put that demand on any prospective buyer of the Marlins, complicating the team’s sale.

Dombrowski’s wife, Karie, had the couple’s first child in March, and Dombrowski has said he would prefer to stay in Florida.

However, he reiterated in a conversation with The Times in Miami the other day that the Dodgers are very attractive. He has told friends that Fox’s financial situation leads him to believe the club can be rebuilt quickly and that the new general manager will have full authority over baseball operations, with no interference from interim GM Tom Lasorda.

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Recent slumps by San Diego’s Andy Ashby and Atlanta’s Greg Maddux have turned the National League Cy Young Award derby into a dogfight, with Ashby’s teammate Kevin Brown and Maddux’s teammate Tom Glavine now the front-runners perhaps.

Maddux is 5-5 in the second half, with a 6.33 earned-run average over his last five games, having given up 31 hits in his last 26 innings. Twice in his last three starts he has yielded three home runs, after going the first 392 starts of his career without yielding three in a game.

While Maddux was losing to Houston and Randy Johnson on Wednesday, Ashby failed for the fourth time to register his 17th win. He lasted only five innings against the New York Mets after going only 3 2/3 innings in each of his two previous starts.

“Maybe I’ve gotten a little lackadaisical and wandered off the concentration path,� he said. “I’ve gotten away from my aggressiveness and started thinking. That’s dangerous.�

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The Montreal Expos, over the years, wouldn’t make a similar financial commitment to a roster of all-star caliber players, among them Pedro Martinez last winter, but they signed outfielder Vladimir Guerrero, 22, to a five-year, $28-million contract, the largest ever for a player with less than two years of big league service.

“There have been questions about our ownership’s commitment to the new ballpark in Montreal, and I think this answers a lot of those questions,� General Manager Jim Beattie said.

The Expos also have recently signed outfielder Rondell White, closer Ugueth Urbina and catcher Chris Widger to multiyear contracts, additional evidence, Beattie said, of the desire to field a championship team when the club moves into a new park in 2001.

When . . . or if? The Expos acknowledge that financing for a downtown park is far from complete, and many baseball officials doubt it will become a reality.