It is odd for me to follow the Dodgers in the playoffs.

When I am not paying close attention, when my subconscious is the ascendant, I am rooting for the Dodgers to win.

That is what I did during my formative years. I was a fan of Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale and Maury Wills and Ron Fairly, and pulling for the Dodgers is what I do.

Or what I did.

Because my brain can give my heart several good reasons why this team is not worthy of love. Or even fondness.

1. The club, now run by these Guggenheim Partners, are a huge improvement on the vile McCourt regime, but they are spending something a bit shy of $300 million on salaries this year. The highest payroll in the majors by $60-some million. And what did the club get for all that spending? An above-average team. Not remotely a great team. Adecent team. And we know you can get a very good team for a lot less money, and ownership groups like this one just throw cash at problems and hope they go away. No way to run a club.

2. This appears to be a team made up of guys who don’t particularly like each other. Yasiel Puig is a problem. Zack Greinke may be a problem. The bullpen, aside from Kenley Jansen may be a problem because so many of the guys down there have come and gone that they are not used to each other yet. Carl Crawford is not quite happy, and neither is Andre Either, and it seems rather like “every man for himself”. That does not impress my brain, either.

3. This Dodgers ownership group is behind the unconscionable two-year TV blackout — at least for a significant majority of fans — who have cable companies that refuse to cough up the exorbitant fees the Dodgers want to charge those cable companies. It was arrogant, as well as presumptuous (not everyone in L.A. is a baseball fan) for the club to think this was going to go down without a fight.

Good reasons, all of them, not to be in love with this team.

But my heart sees that LA on the caps. And the familiar blue uniforms. (Or remembers them, from half a world away.)

And remembers Dodger blue is why I always have preferred blue uniforms on every team. And that incredibly white white set off by the blue.

And my heart recalls great players, and great moments like Koufax’s perfect game and Orel Hershiser’s scoreless streak and Kirk Gibson’s home run and Vin Scully and even Tommy Lasorda, who is mostly shtick but ultimately does bleed Dodger blue.

And, without thinking, I see scores on espn.com and I figure out ways the Dodgers can win and move ahead in the playoffs and maybe even get to the World Series for the first time since 1988.

And then my head gets back involved and says, “Back off, Jack.”

It is weird to be whipsawed like that. “Oh, the Dodgers are losing.” “Oh, that’s right, I don’t care.”

The reality is I do care. Until I think about it.

But the first impulse … is always “go, Blue.” Always.