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LOS ANGELES — When Shohei Ohtani met with the Dodgers‘ brass in the offseason, baseball’s most coveted free agent was allured not only by a superstar roster and an auspicious farm system but also by the way the club thought about the past, a decade of sustained success that included 10 straight trips to the postseason. Despite all the winning, they had only one World Series ring from the pandemic-shortened 2020 season to show for it. They told him they considered it a failure.
Those words stuck with Ohtani when the two-way sensation chose where to spend the next decade of his life. He believed so much in the group constructing the Dodgers’ operation that he tied his future to their decision-makers. A clause in his record 10-year, $700 million contract stipulated that the only way he could opt out is if owner Mark Walter or president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman left the team. He trusted the leaders of the Dodgers to build a winner, and when he deferred $680 million from the most lucrative contract in the sport’s history, pressure mounted on them to do so immediately.
“It was important to Shohei that this wasn’t the one move we were going to make,” Friedman said.
Ten months later, the Dodgers bested the Mets on Sunday to return to the World Series for the first time in four years — not only because of Ohtani, who has thrived in his first postseason and is likely to add a third MVP trophy to his mantle this year, or the other superstars they added in the winter, but also because of the medley of moves Friedman and the Dodgers’ front office made to complete a roster in flux.
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“This is as challenging of a season, in terms of the injuries and adversity and things that popped up, as I can remember,” Friedman, soaked in a concoction of Korbel champagne and Budweiser, said from the home clubhouse Sunday night.
After signing Ohtani in December, the Dodgers upped their free-agent spending over $1 billion by adding pitchers Tyler Glasnow and Yoshinobu Yamamoto late that month. In January, they brought in Teoscar Hernández on a one-year, $23.5 million deal and watched him develop into an All-Star and Home Run Derby champion. They already had three other former MVPs on the roster in Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman and Clayton Kershaw, who was expected to return from offseason shoulder surgery in the second half.
And yet on Sunday night at Dodger Stadium, it was a bullpen game and an unheralded midseason addition that would send them to the World Series with a 10-5 win in Game 6 of the NLCS.
“We have so many different guys who can come through on any given day,” NLCS MVP Tommy Edman said. “I think that’s why we’re so successful.”
For all the money the Dodgers spent, they could never have imagined their playoff roster would look the way it does, with only one starting pitcher from the Opening Day roster available, with only three starting pitchers they can trust to start games in Yamamoto, midseason acquisition Jack Flaherty and a rebounding Walker Buehler, and with Freeman and shortstop Miguel Rojas too hobbled to play.
The Dodgers lost Betts for nearly two months and Yamamoto for nearly three. Kershaw returned from his shoulder issue in July only for his toe to sideline him down the stretch after making just seven starts. Young standout starting pitchers Gavin Stone, Dustin May, River Ryan and Emmet Sheehan were all lost for the year, too.
“This is as determined of a group as I’ve been around,” Friedman said, “and they needed every ounce of it.”
The moves Friedman and general manager Brandon Gomes made at the trade deadline ended up turning depth pieces into starring contributors.
A day before trading for the most coveted starting pitcher on the market in Flaherty, the Dodgers swung a three-team deal to acquire a struggling reliever and a versatile position player who hadn’t played all season. Three months later, Michael Kopech would start the bullpen game that would send the Dodgers to the World Series, while Edman would knock in four runs from manager Dave Roberts’ cleanup spot in the Game 6 clincher.
“It’s something that you always think about, always dream about,” Edman said. “It’s not necessarily something I was expecting.”
Flaherty went from an important depth piece in the rotation to the club’s most-trusted headliner on the mound. Edman helped lengthen a lineup that needed help both in the outfield and at shortstop. The addition of Kopech, who emerged as one of Roberts’ most trusted high-leverage arms, assisted a scuffling bullpen.
But the injuries seemed endless, threatening to derail the Dodgers’ hopes.
“I think there were times during the year with some of the injuries that we had where it was a little bit deflating,” Friedman said. “I think Doc did a great job getting in front of that and pumping some enthusiasm and optimism into the group.”
In September, the Dodgers found out an elbow issue would officially end Glasnow’s All-Star season. At the time, the Dodgers had just dropped two straight games in Atlanta. The Padres and Diamondbacks were closing in on their division lead. Roberts could sense his players were starting to get demoralized.
So he gathered them together for a meeting that Hernández said “changed everything.”
“We realized that we have the potential, that we have the players, that we’re still the Dodgers,” Hernández said.
“I just got a feeling that there was some kind of a little, ‘Woe is me,'” Roberts explained, “and that’s just not who we are.”
The skipper shared a message that he couldn’t believe in his players more than they believed in themselves.
“We had a meeting and said, ‘Guys, look around, we still have Hall of Famers in this room, we still have All-Stars in this room, we have guys that were paid a lot of money in this room, we can still do this,'” Max Muncy explained.
The Dodgers went 11-3 the rest of the season, holding off the Padres, who would later push them to the brink in the NLDS.
Facing elimination in San Diego, the players got together again in the visiting clubhouse of Petco Park to spread a similar message, laced with a few more four-letter words.
That day, Edman filled in for the injured Rojas at shortstop while a group of relievers linked together to hold the Padres off the board in a bullpen game. The Dodgers returned home and spun another shutout started by Yamamoto in the deciding Game 5, ensuring this team was different, more together, more resilient, than the two before it that had bowed out in stunning first-round exits.
“When you’re in that dugout this time of year, if you’re not together as a team, you can tell night and day,” Muncy said. “When you’re talking about 13, 14, 15 guys in that dugout, and they’re all hanging on every pitch, hanging on every single swing with you in the batter’s box, and you can hear them and you can feel them, it makes a big difference.”
The Dodgers outscored the Padres 10-0 in the final two games of the series, then outscored the Mets by 20 runs in the NLCS while plating a series-record 46 runs. And in a series full of former and hopeful MVPs, it was Edman, a deadline addition who didn’t play his first game this year until Aug. 19, who led everyone with 11 hits and 11 RBI.
“You’re talking about a guy that’s Gold Glove level at numerous positions, bats from both sides, steals bases, lays down bunts, gets hits, hits for power,” Muncy said. “You’re talking about an absolute gamer.”
Edman was a league-average hitter with a plus glove at multiple defensive positions in his five years with the Cardinals. This year, offseason wrist surgery and an ankle sprain during his rehab sidelined him for the entire first half. Friedman and the Dodgers’ front office were undeterred. They still wanted him, as they had for years.
“To know that I was valued and coveted by them, it’s a good feeling,” Edman said. “It gives me confidence.”
Down the stretch, he played primarily center field and offered Rojas the ability to get off his feet at shortstop. On six different occasions, he played both positions in the same game. That ability is especially crucial now. After starting in center the first three games of the NLDS, Edman has played shortstop every game since. He has also hit in five different spots in the Dodgers’ order this postseason.
“I never imagined once we acquired him, he’d be hitting fourth in a postseason game,” Roberts said. “But I trust him. The guys trust him.”
With the Mets turning to lefty Sean Manaea, it allowed the switch-hitting Edman to hit from the right side, where he has excelled this year. On Sunday, he delivered a two-run double his first time up and a two-run homer his next time up. The Dodgers tagged the Mets for 10 runs for the second time in three games, while their fourth game with at least eight runs tied another postseason record.
Edman’s 11 RBIs in the NLCS tied him with Corey Seager (2020 NLCS) for the most in a postseason series by a Dodgers player. Kopech, meanwhile, became a key piece of a makeshift pitching staff that at one point tied a playoff record with 33 consecutive scoreless innings pitched, dating back to the end of the NLDS.
The Dodgers’ scoreless innings streak ended in Game 2 of the NLCS, when a bullpen game went awry. On Sunday, Roberts utilized the strategy again to better effect, having saved most of his most trusted arms for the occasion.
“To go from a season that I was struggling on a team that was struggling, to be able to have success on a team that’s having a lot of success means the world to me,” Kopech said. “To be a part of this, where guys are doing what they’re doing, guys like Shohei, Mookie and Freddie putting his whole body on the line to go out there and play for as much as he can this postseason, for guys like Tommy to show up and be more than a role player and be the star that I think he is, it’s really special.”
Entering Game 6, Kopech, Evan Phillips and Daniel Hudson had each pitched only once this series, not only keeping them fresh but also limiting their exposure to Mets hitters. Blake Treinen and Anthony Banda were plenty rested, too. With the offense exploding for 10 runs, the bullpen game’s five runs would suffice.
Ohtani reached base three times and scored twice. Hernández, who was hitless in the first five games, and Will Smith snapped out of their slumps. Betts had an RBI double in the eighth that put the game away. And there was Edman, who had multiple hits for a third straight game.
“You look at what happened in the offseason, you sign Shohei, and you’ve got so many superstars on the team, it’s kind of the expectation to have success,” Edman said. “I think to have those expectations and come through on all those is impressive and says a lot about the group we have here.”
In an MLB season without a 100-game winner, a ravaged Dodgers club still emerged as the top seed in the National League with the best record in baseball. Beyond their superstars, some shrewd deadline additions and a bevy of relief arms helped mask their deficiencies to start the postseason.
Now, a marquee matchup against the American League’s top seed awaits, with the Dodgers and Yankees meeting Friday in the first World Series clash between the storied franchises since 1981.
“You’re talking about the absolute biggest stars in the game, and now they’re going to be playing on the biggest stage,” Muncy said. “As a fan, how special is this, man?
Rowan Kavner is an MLB writer for FOX Sports. He previously covered the L.A. Dodgers, LA Clippers and Dallas Cowboys. An LSU grad, Rowan was born in California, grew up in Texas, then moved back to the West Coast in 2014. Follow him on Twitter at @RowanKavner.
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Link to Original Article - on Fox Sports