Dodgers: One Team Won the Off-Season; It Wasn’t the Dodgers

Trade for Jean Segura

The Dodgers came into the offseason with a hole at second base. Really, they came into each of the last few seasons with underperforming second basemen, from Howie Kendrick to Logan Forsythe. Since the departure of Dee Gordon, the team has not had a high batting average leadoff hitter who can steal some bases and manufacture runs.

Jean Segura could have solved that. The 28-year old middle infielder went to the Phillies for a veteran salary dump in Carlos Santana and an aging former-top prospect in J.P. Crawford, neither of which should have been players good enough to net an All-Star shortstop. The Dodgers’ front office had contracts that they wanted to dump (ie. Matt Kemp, Alex Wood, Yasiel Puig), and yet they chose to stay away from Segura.

Segura has hit .300 or better in each of the last three seasons, with 10+ steals and 20+ home runs in each of those as well. Segura is an average defender, not adding much or detracting much when playing either middle infield position. He is a rare player that hits for a high average and makes tons of contact in an era when contact is becoming a premium skill.

The Dodgers really don’t have much batting average built into their current roster, with Corey Seager and Justin Turner, the only potential .300 hitters, often battling injuries.

Segura would not only have provided the top of the Dodgers’ order a lefty-killer (he hit .313 against lefties in 182 plate appearances in 2018), he also could have been a long-term solution at second base. Segura is signed through 2022 with an option for 2023 in what are the remnants of his 5-year, $70 million contract.

The Phillies made a great move in signing Segura to be their everyday shortstop for the foreseeable future, and the Dodgers should have done the same and made Segura their second basemen for the next few seasons.

Sign Andrew McCutchen

The next move the Phillies made in their stellar offseason was to sign Andrew McCutchen. One of a few former-MVPs available this offseason (and one of two the Phillies signed), McCutchen could have provided exactly what Dodgers-signee A.J. Pollock is expected to produce, but with more stability and less injury risk.

Pollock is 31 and has played only more than 130 games once in his career. He has eclipsed 110 games 4 times, but if a player is being signed after the age of 30 for over $10 million per year as Pollock is, one would hope to be able to count on production.

While McCutchen cost more than Pollock, he was less of a long-term commitment, as the Phillies netted McCutchen for 3 years and $50 million versus the 5-year, $60 million deal the Dodgers gave Pollock.

But the extra money is well worth the cost. The 32-year old McCutchen not only has a more proven track record of success (again, see his MVP award, Gold Glove, five All-Star games, and four Silver Sluggers) but is also much more durable.

McCutchen has not played in less than 146 games since his rookie year back in 2009. McCutchen is the epitome of stability, and for a team that likes to rotate players around, it may have been nice to have a player like McCutchen to provide an anchor at the top of the lineup and in the outfield that could be counted on to produce all season long and not just for 110 or so games of it.

Trade for J.T. Realmuto

This was the move every Dodger fan wanted before rumors of obtaining Harper and Kluber began to surface. Realmuto would have filled the Dodgers most obvious need: Catcher.

The All-Star catcher’s price ballooned beyond what even the All-Star Marlins Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich, and Marcell Ozuna brought back. Realmuto cost the Phillies a lot, but he is the consensus best catcher in the game today, and his price was commensurate with his value.  The Dodgers should have paid it.

Realmuto to the Dodgers would have made tons of sense. He hits for average and power, he is not a defensive liability and he can even steal bases. In his four big league seasons, Realmuto hit 10+ home runs in each, finishing with a career-high 21 last season, to go along with three seasons of hitting above .270 and stealing 8+ bases, both of which things Yasmani Grandal never could provide the Dodgers.

Over the last three seasons, the 6’1 catcher amassed a WAR of 12.3. To put that in a league context, Buster Posey has accumulated 10 WAR over the last three seasons and Grandal 9 WAR.

All of this is to say that Realmuto’s price was exorbitant by the end, but the Phillies took the initiative to try and win sooner rather than later, and as the Dodgers’ window inches closer and closer to slamming shut, missing on this game-changing talent behind the plate could be looked back upon in retrospect as the Dodgers’ biggest mistake this offseason.

Sign David Robertson

The Dodgers really never seemed to want to commit to the former-Yankee standout. A 33-year old righty with a premium background,  Robertson did not quite fit the mold of Dodgers’ relievers. The team chose the younger, harder-throwing Joe Kelly over Robertson this offseason, despite Kelly’s lack of closing experience and lackluster regular season numbers.

Here’s the best statistical reason the Dodgers should have signed Robertson, as articulated by Michael Wittman back in December:

Over the last three seasons, David Robertson has allowed a .187 average to opposing batters.  Right-handed batters have hit just .195 against Robertson and lefties have done even worse hitting .177.  It wouldn’t matter who came in to hit in the eighth inning against him, he can do the job equally effective against either side.

Robertson could have stepped in for Jansen to give the fan-favorite more time to rest between outings while not sacrificing quality. Robertson has not fallen to injuries really at any point during his career either, as he has pitched in 60 or more games in every season of his career besides his rookie year.

Robertson also cost relatively little in comparison to other relievers of his caliber have signed for. Representing himself in favor of an agent, Robertson signed for 2 years and $23 million this offseason. He didn’t require the third year Joe Kelly did.

And he comes with more playoff experience than Kelly. Robertson has 33.2 innings of postseason experience under his belt with a 3.48 ERA (though the peripherals say he should have been better) and 5 wins.

The Dodgers chose the new trendy reliever over the proven commodity, a choice that may prove costly over the next few seasons, or at the very least every time they find themselves playing the Phillies these next two seasons.

Sign Bryce Harper

Now I’ll admit I was against the Dodgers signing Bryce Harper, as I wrote back in December. Here was my main argument on why the Dodgers would be best to let him sign elsewhere:

My claim is that he is a bad fit for the Dodgers as they are currently constructed and that they would be better served finding more supplementary pieces or a different star rather than signing the biggest fish on the market today. For the money it would take to get Harper, the Dodgers could do so much more. His gigantic price tag could put the Dodgers in a hole for years to come, and this mega-salary would just be too risky for the benefits it could provide.

My argument hinged on the Dodgers signing small pieces and maintaining flexibility after the next few seasons. Some of this was because of the impending availability of big free agents arguably more-skilled and more stable than Harper, like Nolan Arenado and Mike Trout in the coming offseasons. But Arenado is now locked up to stick with Colorado and Trout’s price may far exceed the Dodgers options.

I also felt that resigning players like Corey Seager, Cody Bellinger, and Walker Buehler could be made difficult in the next four, five, six years if the Dodgers were hamstrung by a Harper megadeal.

The Phillies signed Harper to a 13-year deal with no opt-outs and a full no-trade clause, meaning both sides are firmly in this together. He got roughly $25 million per season for this deal, adding up to $330 million over the deal’s lifetime. While this is, of course, lots of money, the average annual value of this deal is not as astronomical as media reports had me believing back in December.

A $25 million per year Harper could have been a valuable addition to the Dodgers, but of course, the 13-year deal was too much of a commitment.

That’s why I loved the Dodgers’ reported 4-year, $185 million offer to Harper, one that would have destroyed any previous $-per-year record. The Dodgers would have been hamstrung for the life of that contract. They’d have had to have drawn even more from their farm system in order to fill their holes as they popped up over the next four years.

But the Dodgers could have done it. They have one of MLB’s best farm systems. They would have been over the luxury tax. Most importantly they would have been a near lock to win the National League for those next four seasons.

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Seeing how things played out in terms of Harper’s desire for a long-term deal, I am glad the Dodgers missed on Harper, but if he would have taken the precedent-shattering short-term deal from the Dodgers, I would have been all for the bold move from the front office.

Instead, the team ended up not only Harper-less but also without little to show from all of their offseason rumors. In reality, all they did of note was swap the fan-favorite Yasiel Puig and All-Star Alex Wood for minor leaguers and cap space, and sign Joe Kelly and A.J. Pollock to deals that have been seen as risky overpays by some.

Don’t get me wrong, the Dodgers should still win the NL West. The Rockies were relatively quiet and no other NL West team is near the Dodgers in terms of overall talent on the MLB roster today. But still, when I look at the Phillies’ offseason, I grow envious. I wanted these players in LA, and I did not think it was possible for the Dodgers to get them all of course.

And yet the Phillies did just that. They signed all five of these studs. If the Dodgers want to win in November before the departure of Kershaw and the rest of the core, the front office and ownership will need to buckle down and begin to think with a win-now mentality.  Otherwise, all we’ll get is more November tears.