Corey Seager's October prowess must teach Dodgers, Andrew Friedman a valuable lesson

Corey Seager might've had some stinker playoff series with the Los Angeles Dodgers, but his performance during the team's 2020 World Series run changed the narrative completely, even if it was mostly played without fans in the stands.

Before that, Seager managed to make an impact as a 22- and 23-year-old with impressive moments in the 2016 and 2017 NLDS. He was robbed of the 2017 NLCS and the entirety of the team's 2018 run due to injuries.

Some unfortunate occurrences, some bad performances. But overall, he showed enough early on in his young career. The Dodgers had something going with Seager, Cody Bellinger, Joc Pederson, Kiké Hernandez and Justin Turner -- a core of players who rose to the occasion more times than not in October.

And so far, the Dodgers have gotten crushed by almost all of those players' departures. Pederson led the Braves to a World Series in 2021. Hernandez helped propel the Red Sox to an improbable ALCS run in 2021. Turner's only been gone for a year, but we wouldn't be surprised if he did something with the Sox or somebody else in 2024 should he sneak into the playoffs. Bellinger's resurgent 2023 could have him dominating in the playoffs on another team very soon.

Seager, who was undoubtedly the most valuable player of the bunch, has burned the Dodgers, too, after earning another World Series berth on Monday in taking down the Astros in Houston with a clutch performance in Game 7 of the ALCS.

Corey Seager's October prowess must teach Dodgers, Andrew Friedman a valuable lesson

Seager just ran through the entire slate of Texas' AL opponents. Here's what he did against each of them across 12 total games:

• vs Tampa Bay Rays - .625/.700/.1000 with 2 runs scored, 3 doubles, 2 RBI, 2 BB
• vs Baltimore Orioles - .333/.733/.833 with 4 runs scored, 1 HR, 1 RBI, 9 BB (!!)
• vs Houston Astros - .258/.303/.516 with 6 runs scored, 2 doubles, 2 HR, 3 RBI

The Rangers have won two more postseason series in 2023 than the Dodgers have since 2021. The Rangers spent the last two years being aggressive in free agency and on the trade market while the Dodgers remained passive. That brings us to our next (and brief) argument about Jordan Montgomery. This is more shameful for the Yankees, but the Dodgers could've had him at a very fair price at the 2023 trade deadline and deemed it too pricey.

The moral of the story here is that the Dodgers have prioritized all the wrong things when it's come to their own impending free agents/spending on the open market. They had some of the league's best postseason performers in their own backyard and willingly let them go. They've made lateral moves at best, as opposed to striking while the iron's hot and using their resources to go above and beyond.

We thought LA's early elimination in 2023 was enough to sound the alarm, but now that they've watched Seager (and Trea Turner, and other free agent misses like Bryce Harper) display the October gumption the Dodgers have embarrassingly lacked the last two years, this year's "organizational failure" should result in a complete 180 in the front office's approach.