Dodgers switching Mookie Betts' position may have been a free agency ploy

Mookie Betts has moved positions so many times since joining the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2020 that it's been hard to keep up. Now, it sounds like yet another position shift is coming in 2025.

Speaking to the media at the MLB general manager meetings earlier this month, Dodgers executive vice president and GM Brandon Gomes announced that the club planned to move Betts back to the infield next season... again.

For context, Betts played 65 games at shortstop, 43 games in right field and 18 games at second base last season. In 2023, he played 107 games in right field, 70 at second base and 16 at shortstop. Gomes didn't specify whether Betts would move back to shortstop or second base (or both) next season, but it has prompted plenty of speculation about the Dodgers' defensive plans for 2025.

Most of the speculation around Betts' latest position change revolves around the Dodgers potentially clearing a space in right field for free agent slugger Juan Soto. But Soto might not be the only highly touted free agent the Dodgers have their eye on this offseason.

Dodgers switching Mookie Betts' position may have been a free agency ploy

If the Dodgers are committed to playing Betts in the infield, second base might make the most sense in order to extend his career. But that would mean displacing second baseman Gavin Lux, a former first-round pick who had a strong finish to the 2024 season with an .899 second-half OPS and 2.0 fWAR, and who remains under team control via arbitration.

Still, if the Dodgers do decide to make Betts their primary second baseman and trade Lux, that leaves holes at both right field and shortstop. Los Angeles has already been linked to top free agent shortstop Willy Adames, but there have been doubts as to whether the club would be willing to make the financial commitment required to bring him in.

At the end of the day, Betts' impending position change gives the Dodgers flexibility on the free agent market this offseason. Will they sign Adames? Soto? Both? Neither? Regardless, they have options, and announcing that Betts would be making another shift may very well have been Gomes' way of floating a test balloon to see how different free agent targets might respond.

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