Weird Dodgers-Yankees ‘Evil Empire’ debate has even NY players turning on their owner

You’d think that beating the Yankees in the World Series would be enough for the Dodgers’ to get under the New Yorkers’ skin, but somehow it took a strange comment by the Yankees’ own Hal Steinbrenner to shake the Bronx Bombers. The Yankees owner quipped to YES Network that the Dodgers now the team to beat, at least from a spending perspective.

Let’s just say, the Yankees' players (and the rest of baseball) weren’t buying that the Dodgers are the new “Evil Empire.”

Sure, the nickname for the Yankees came from George Steinbrenner’s unrelenting pursuit of international talent amid the team’s late 1990s/early 2000s glory, a time when the club had the largest payroll and had played in six of eight World Series between 1996 and 2003. Comparisons to the Dodgers, who have made four of the past eight World Series and have the second-largest payroll in the Majors, are obvious, but the vibes are off.

The Dodgers as the new “Evil Empire” narrative is laughable even to the Yankees

For one, the Yankees love to embrace their role as a villain. They play the “Imperial March,” and they sued for the rights to the “Evil Empire” moniker. Meanwhile, the Dodgers are proving that nice guys can finish first. Freddie Freeman and Mookie Betts are, of course, MVP-caliber players every year, but few can imagine them as the villains.

They also seem devoted to fan favorites. Teoscar Hernández returned to the fold after winning the hearts of Dodgers fans at the World Series parade, and Kiké Hernández, the king of fun in the dugout, is back with the team after a stint in Boston. They continue to do right by “Dodger for life” Clayton Kershaw, who is back for his 18th season in LA.

In fact, the Dodgers are as committed to their homegrown stars as they are to landing premium free-agent talent. MLB.com has listed LA in the Top 10 among farm systems on seven straight rankings; they currently sit at No. 4. Yes, just five of the Dodgers’ projected 26-man roster were acquired via the draft, but that doesn’t mean the team bought its success. Just 11 of the players on the 40-man roster were signed as free agents.

But the clearest indicator of the Dodgers’ shirking of the “Evil Empire” moniker is their sense of fun. The Yankees are all old school seriousness. You can hear it in the strains of “New York, New York” that play after each win (and only wins from now on). The Dodgers, though, are Randy Newman singing “I Love L.A.” Nothing is less evil than the guy who composed the songs for Toy Story.

So, the Yankees can keep their evil. After all, they’ve only won one World Series since adopting the nickname. The Dodgers, meanwhile, have been better while acting as the antithesis to the older days of the Yankees' dynasty.