Jim Bowden using Dodgers, Marlins’ early results as proof of parity in baseball is delusional

The Los Angeles Dodgers are doing their usual thing this year, posting a 12-4 record and +46 run differential to lead the league. Unlike their payroll contemporaries in New York, the Dodgers' big dollars are producing big results.

Leave it to everyone's favorite former general manager Jim Bowden to draw comparisons between the Goliath of baseball and the upstart Miami Marlins. Citing the Marlins' winning record (9-8) through April 13 and 50-43 performance dating back to the middle of last season, Bowden claimed that parity is alive and well in the sport in 2026.

The sentiment is nice. The rest of the league would surely love it if someone could dethrone the Dodgers, or at least merely keep pace with them.

But the Dodgers, who are 49-34 in the regular season since the 2025 All-Star Break, are clearly in a league of their own (and have outpaced the Marlins in that span). They're the reason MLB appears headed toward a salary cap-based lockout in December. It'd take a miracle for anyone, let alone the Marlins, to stop the three-peat train in its tracks.

Dodgers can't assume anything, but they remain the team to beat in 2026

It would be arrogant to assume the Dodgers are infallible. There's a reason no team has done what they're trying to do since the 1998-2000 Yankees. Plenty of other squads were designed specifically with the titans of Los Angeles in mind.

But parity is a two-way street, and the rest of the league hasn't been holding up their end of the bargain. The Mets have tried to spend their way to the top like the Dodgers but faceplanted last year and are currently in last place in the NL East. The Braves look like a juggernaut again, but anyone betting on their already-decimated pitching staff to remain healthy might as well make a donation to charity.

If parity does exist this year, it's in the American League. Only six teams have a positive run differential right now. The standings may be jumbled up, but like always, the cream of the crop will rise to the top over the course of 162 games.

In fairness to Bowden, he ended his section on the resurrection of parity by kowtowing to the Dodgers' dominance, writing that "Outside of the NL West, where I believe the Dodgers will win the division by 10 games or more, I think we’ll have legitimate three-team (or more) races for the division titles."

At the very least, that's hard to argue with.

Add us as a preferred source on Google

Follow