Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
Welcome back to reading and reacting to other people writing about stuff on the Internet, where I promise to try and do this feature regularly as was always intended.
======
Governor Gavin Newsom: Mark Walter, Magic Johnson, and Casey Wasserman will lead an initiative called LA Rises to support wildfire recovery and rebuilding.
To seed this new effort, Dodgers Chairman Mark Walter, the Mark Walter Family Foundation, and the Los Angeles Dodgers Foundation have provided an initial commitment of up to $100 million. With plans to raise additional funds through private donations, LA Rises will provide major resources aimed at helping Los Angeles communities most affected by these catastrophic fires recover and rebuild.
That is … a lot.
——
True Blue LA: Eric Stephen notes a change from the Dodgers back to pursuing strikeouts from their pitching staff after a two-year lull, which also uncoincidentally were two subpar run prevention years.
What the Dodgers are trying to do this year is add as many pitchers as possible, trying to stockpile enough depth to withstand inevitable injuries. But aside from quantity, the innings they are potentially adding are high quality as well. Expect the strikeouts to go back up and the Dodgers to be among the best in the league at run prevention again in 2025.
About time, honestly.
FanGraphs: Mookie Betts has still been performing like a potential MVP, but Davy Andrews points out red flags in his underlying metrics from 2024. Despite the fact that he broke his wrist, it’s at least worth monitoring in 2025, as Father Time is undefeated.
I don’t want to overreact to a single season, let alone one in which Betts produced his typical fantastic offensive numbers — especially considering that Betts missed nearly two months with a fractured hand. This is one of those times when I really wish we had bat tracking data stretching back over the last several years. Betts had an average bat speed of 69.1 mph in 2024, which put him in just the 14th percentile, and I wish there were a way to know whether that was a big drop-off from previous seasons. He turned 32 last year, and just Tuesday, Tom Tango published an aging curve that makes it look like there’s a dramatic bat speed drop-off starting at 32. If you look at Betts’ spray charts and his contact rates, you get the sense that he just reworked his approach in order to make the most of the pitches he was seeing. However, the exit velocity numbers are such an extreme departure from his previous seasons. To some degree, they’re probably a symptom of that larger adjustment, but Betts’ bat may just be slower than it used to be.
——
The Athletic: Keith Law’s Top 100 is out, and despite excluding Roki Sasaki, he has five other Dodgers like the other lists. Dalton Rushing checks in at #16, Josue De Paula at #26, River Ryan at #52, Zyhir Hope at #58, and Alex Freeland at #68. Ryan is the anomaly on this list, as he’ll miss the 2025 season, but what he showed in his brief 2024 stint was convincing enough.
The Athletic: Jackson Ferris and Kellon Lindsey were named among those who barely missed on the Top 100.
The Athletic: Overall, the Dodgers were named the #3 farm system in baseball.
Even without counting Roki Sasaki as a prospect, the Dodgers still have one of the best and deepest systems in the sport. They have stayed that way since Andrew Friedman first took over as president of baseball operations, because he has maintained sizable scouting staffs on the amateur, pro, and international sides; built up their R&D department; and brought the people-management style he used in Tampa to the bigger budgets (OK, much bigger budgets) of Los Angeles. Teams that try to do this on the cheap haven’t been able to sustain success like the Dodgers have. The Dodgers’ system right now still has a bunch of high-upside position players and arms, with an emphasis on athletes, complemented by some higher-floor finds from the college ranks in the draft, usually coming beyond the first round.
ESPN: Kiley McDaniel’s Top 100 is also out, and it features a whopping eight Dodgers prospects. Roki is #1, Rushing is #16, De Paula is #20, Freeland checks in up at #37, Hope at #70, Emil Morales is a new one at #80, Ferris is #93, and Ryan is #94.
ESPN: He also did another 100, which included another pair of Dodgers. Eduardo Quintero came in at #106 (named among those who could make the Top 50 in 2026), and Justin Wrobleski at #149 (named among those who could throw 200 innings in a season).
ESPN: The system is valued at $420 million, which is … #1 in baseball. Phew.
Los Angeles got here via a number of scouting and developmental avenues to maximize their system. Among their prospects on the top 100 list: Dalton Rushing was a top-50 overall pick, Alex Freeland was a third-round pick, Emil Morales got a top international bonus, Josue De Paula got a lower-to-midrange international bonus, and Jackson Ferris and Zyhir Hope were non-top 100 prospects a year ago when both were acquired from the Cubs for infielder Michael Busch. The Dodgers are so good because they are one of the most efficient franchises in baseball from top to bottom (you could argue for the Rays, Brewers or Guardians, too) and they also have a ton of money.
——
The Athletic: With fairness on seemingly everybody’s mind nowadays, Eno Sarris looked at parity among leagues four different ways and found that … well, baseball has graded out quite well.
But considering that we found four ways to judge parity, each with slightly different results, it’s completely fair to feel that this level of parity is not enough. There certainly is an advantage to spending, even if the numbers suggest that benefit might be smaller than it seems right now, with the Dodgers coming off a championship and spending liberally to try to stay at the top.
Not exactly surprising if one just takes a step back from the salt with some sense, honestly.
Forbes: Meanwhile, MLB reported record revenues of $12.1 billion in 2024, a 4.3% increase over 2023, and that’s excluding “ancillary revenues” like mixed-use development and what not. The other teams are broke, though, don’t forget.
======
It’s almost time for Dodger baseball, baby.
