* – Using “boner” in its original sense, which means an error or blunder. Such as the infamous “Merkle’s Boner” of 1908.

Ned Colletti has made more than his share of colossally bad moves, but this is the worst.

Jason Schmidt, right-handed pitcher — three years, $47 million.

And now, more than halfway through the third and final year of that monster contract, Jason Schmidt apparently is returning to the Dodgers’ starting rotation, going Monday against the Reds. It will be (trumpet fanfare) his seventh start as a Dodger and first since July of 2007, when he made a brief attempt to come back from the arm/shoulder trouble that cropped up back in April of Year 1 of the Dodgers Giveaway.

Here is why this is Ned’s worst/dumbest signing:

He should have known better.

Yes, pitchers are fragile creatures. Like race horses. They can look great but be one stride/pitch from catastrophic breakdown.

Normally, you can’t quite hold GMs accountable for pitchers who break down. But this is a little different — because Colletti had a ringside seat for four-and-a-half seasons of Jason Schmidt, when Schmidt was with the Giants and Colletti was an assistant GM there … and he had to know how delicate Schmidt’s right shoulder was.

Schmidt had been on the DL four times from 2001-2005, three times (2001, 2004, 2005) for trouble in his right shoulder. He also missed starts in 2002 with what was described as shoulder pain, and in 2003 with what was called an elbow problem.

That is, Schmidt had arm/shoulder trouble every season from 2001 through 2005, with Ned watching him from the press box. Schmidt managed to get through 2006, his walk year, without going on the DL, but he was extremely erratic that year — overpowering in one start, awful the next. Like a guy pitching through pain, let’s say, to increase his potential earning power in free agency.

Or the sort of warning signs a canny GM should have noticed.

But that didn’t stop Ned from committing $47 million Dodger Dollars to Schmidt before the 2007 season, and Schmidt has responded by appearing in six games, going 1-4 with 6.31 ERA.

That is a disaster.

So, let’s rank Ned’s Top Ten Biggest Boners while occupying the GM position in Los Angeles. And remember, this is only his fourth season; the man is just getting warmed up.

10. Trading Dioner Navarro for Mark Hendrickson in June of 2006. It wasn’t so much giving up Navarro (who did have a nice 2008 season for the Rays, AL champs), because he was struggling and Russell Martin was ready to go … it was giving away anything of value for Mark Hendrickson. Hendrickson has been a Human Batting Practice Machine throughout his career. With the Dodgers he went 6-15 with an ERA of around 5.00 and an opposition batting average of nearly .300. While making more than $4 million. Oh, and Navarro finally came around; he arguably was better than Martin in 2008.

9. Traded outfielder Cody Ross to Cincinnati in April of 2006 for, essentially, nothing (reliever Ben Kozlowski). Ross has since become a productive regular with the Florida Marlins, hitting 22 homers with 73 RBI in 2008 and 14 homers with 52 RBI so far in 2009.

8. Signing Bill Mueller to a two-year, $9.5 million contract before the 2006 season, when Mueller’s knee was about to explode. (Mueller lasted 32 games before his career was over, but not before that lovely parting gift from Ned.)

7. Trading right-hander Edwin Jackson, only 22 at the time and now a Detroit Tigers stalwart, for two useless relievers (Danys Baez and Lance Carter) before the 2006 season.

6. Releasing Jayson Werth before the 2007 season, just in time for him to resurrect his career in Philadelphia where he puts up power numbers that would have him hitting in, like, the 6 hole for the Dodgers.

5. Signing Brett Tomko, fresh off an 8-15 season, to a two-year, $8.7 million contract before the 2006 season. Tomko then went 10-18 with an ERA over 5.00 with the Dodgers.

4. Signing Nomar Garciaparra to a two-year, $18.9 contract before the 2007 season. Nomar was done, done, done and was, arguably, one of the feeblest guys playing regularly in 2007 — before he got even worse (and more fragile) in 2008.

3. Signing Juan Pierre for five years, $44 million before the 2007 season. Juan Pierre is a good guy, and a gamer, but his skill set is quite modest — which everyone in baseball knew before Ned panicked (after J.D. Drew bolted, after the 2006 season) and signed the first veteran outfielder he could find. Pierre can run and he can put a ball in play, but that’s all he can do, and you can get guys like that for the major-league minimum. For $44 million you can get about 44 of them. Cody Ross (see No. 9, above) is a far better player and makes about $1 million this year.

2. Signing Andruw Jones for two years, $36.2 million, before the 2008 season. ‘Druw was coming off his worst year, and Ned should have been more cautious when Jones’s team, the Braves, made no attempt to sign him. So “caution” in this case, was committing “only” $36.2 million to a guy who arrived in camp fat and out of shape and almost personally killed the team for two months before he was parked. Jones put up some astonishingly pathetic numbers: 209 at-bats, three homers, 14 RBI, a .158 batting average and a .256 OBP in 75 astoundingly wretched games. Jones now is vaguely useful to the Texas Rangers, with 14 homers and 34 RBI in limited time — while the Dodgers continue to pay off the rest of his restructured contract for the next five seasons.

1. Signing Jason Schmidt for three years, $47 million. And the only way Schmidt gets out of the top spot in Ned’s Biggest Boners is if he stays in the rotation the rest of this season and puts up 9-10 quality starts. Which could happen, but so could the sun going supernova on us before October. He could be the Dodgers’ biggest signing boner of all time, actually. The “lead standard” to date has been the five-year, $55 million deal the Dodgers gave Darren Dreifort before the 2001 season. Dreifort won all of nine games during the life of that contract, meaning each victory cost the Dodgers about $6 million. Schmidt, however, is in position to break that mark; so far, he has cost the Dodgers $47 million for one victory.

Now that’s a boner.