3 best Adrián González moments with Los Angeles Dodgers

Over the weekend former Los Angeles Dodgers first baseman Adrián González announced his retirement, which was somewhat of a surprise because González hadn’t appeared in an MLB game since 2018.

Nevertheless, González’s announcement closes the chapter on an era of Dodgers baseball, where they ascended to the top tier of the league, which began with a blockbuster deal that brought González to Los Angeles in 2012.

In six years with the Dodgers, González batted .280, had a 119 OPS+, clubbed 101 home runs and drove in 448 runs, mostly from the cleanup spot. In 30 postseason games with LA, González hit seven home runs and drove in 21 runs.

But his tenure ended abruptly in late 2017 when, after being sidelined since late April because of a bad back, González removed himself from the team after being left off the postseason roster and then reappeared from a vacation in Italy once the Dodgers made the World Series. With his Dodgers career over, González was shipped off to the New York Mets in the offseason.

Despite how things ended, one cannot dispute the impact González had with the Dodgers in the early days of the Guggenheim Partner ownership. So let’s honor his top three moments in a Dodgers uniform.

3. Adrián González Makes His Introduction

González made quite a first impression in his Dodgers debut — on August 25th, 2012 against the Miami Marlins — after being brought over in a blockbuster trade with the Boston Red Sox that included nine players and $258 million.

In front of 40,000 fans in Dodger Stadium, González stepped to the plate with two on in the bottom of the first in his first at-bat. Down 0-1 in the count, he tore into the second pitch and deposited a three-run home run down the right-field line to give the team a lead they would not relinquish.

It was a display of what was yet to come for the Dodgers and the first of 108 (including the postseason) home runs Gonzalez would hit for the boys in blue.