It really was the only place Teoscar Hernandez wanted to be, and why not? He’d won a championship with these guys and they certainly look capable of doing this again…And again.
He’d probably spoken to his good friend Vladimir Guerrero Jr. The Blue Jays were hoping to get the outfielder back. The Jays however hadn’t given his buddy a satisfactory contract offer as he enters his walk season, so that was a non starter.
The Dodgers do what so many teams refuse to do. They spend their money on players. They also have a lot of money. They are gathering talent at a level not known before. They are pushing the separation between the haves and have nots to the point of bursting.
They don’t care. They don’t care if you cry because they can do this. They don’t care if you whine because they are over the billion dollar mark in deferred money owed to players. Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman knows they have a plan:
A lot of our ownership group are from financial background and can have that money going to work right now, and just making it — not something that sneaks up on us. We’re not going to wake up in 2035 and [say], ‘Oh my God, that’s right. We have this money due.’ We’ll plan for it along the way.”
They have lived through the Yankees money domination and the Astros stealing a world series. The Dodgers are so good they didn’t bend over backwards for Juan Soto. Instead they got Teoscar back and signed Michael Conforto to play right field.
Friedman makes it all work
They can play it any way you like. They have the money of course but ten years ago they made their best signing. Snatching Friedman away from Tampa Bay.
In Friedman they got a guy who learned how to do it without money. Helping the cash strapped Rays to four playoff appearances. So the Dodgers can buy players, trade for them and draft them.
Young talent waiting
Youngsters from the organization are knocking on the door. The Conforto signing puts a temporary halt to the playing time for young outfielders Andy Pages (23) and Dalton Rushing (23) who can also catch.
Talented pitcher Bobby Miller’s (25) progress was delayed by 2024 shoulder trouble and now he and Landon Knack (26) are looking at a tough march through one of the deepest rotations in the history of baseball.
And way you look at it the Dodgers are going to be trouble for quite awhile. The crapshoot that the expanded playoffs have become might cut into some of their championship aspirations but they’ve got a good chance at repeated title opportunities and perhaps a dynasty.
