Dodgers: Andrew Friedman’s offseason mindset will get fans hyped
Dodgers fans are ready for more after winning the World Series in 2020, and so is Andrew Friedman.
The Los Angeles Dodgers fought long and hard for 32 years to win a World Series championship prior to the end of the 2020 season.
Sometimes, they scratched and clawed and wound up hanging by their fingernails on a window pane, perilously close to their goal but still unable to climb one level higher. Sometimes, everything fell apart far sooner than that. But no matter the process, the ending was always depressing.
This time? The ending features unvarnished joy. And if it’s up to President of Baseball Operations Andrew Friedman, these feelings won’t be going away anytime soon.
Though Friedman is basking in the title just like the rest of Dodgers Nation, he has one goal for this offseason: find a way to do it all again.
As Friedman, recently named Executive of the Year, told SportsNet LA on Wednesday, “Days after, the text threads with coaches and various front office…the mindset was, ‘Let’s be pigs. Let’s do everything we can to go out next year and do it again.'”
Let’s. Be. Pigs.
Whether Justin Turner, Kiké Hernández, and others return or not is a specific problem that Friedman must address in the next few weeks. But however he arrives at the finish line, the stated end goal is gluttony and a repeat, which every Dodgers fan can get behind. Now’s the time to be greedy.
For years, we’ve watched other teams celebrate lone titles way too long into the future. You can get a lot of mileage out of a singular championship if you’re loud about it — just ask the ’08 Celtics.
But the Dodgers have no intention of cutting themselves off at one, and Friedman represents the collective mood well.
“For me, it’s been more wearing the hat,” Friedman said this week. “I’ve been wearing the hat a lot, backwards, with the trophy front and center on my forehead. And whenever I pass by a mirror, it’s like, ‘Oh yeah, we won!’ We’re the champion!’ so it’s a helpful reminder.”
A reminder that there’s more work left to do and more years to celebrate, too.