In recent years, baseball has become a case of the haves and the have-nots, but no team has flexed their financial muscles on the rest of MLB more than the Los Angeles Dodgers. Many of this offseason’s headlines have been dominated by the Dodgers and their pursuit of nearly every major free agent of note. Which … should be what all the teams are trying to do, right?
Since winning the World Series in November, Los Angeles has made significant additions to its championship roster, including signing left-hander Blake Snell, outfielder Michael Conforto, late-inning relievers Tanner Scott and Kirby Yates, and international free-agent second baseman Hyeseong Kim. The Dodgers also added the No. 1 international prospect, right-hander Roki Sasaki, and re-signed outfielder Teoscar Hernandez, utilityman Kiké Hernandez and, most recently, longtime ace Clayton Kershaw.
It’s an overwhelming amount of offseason acquisitions. But it’s not like the transactional dominance that L.A. has exhibited compared to the rest of the league couldn’t have been slowed down by the other 29 teams. The Dodgers’ outlook for this season is something they had quite a bit of help in creating.
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When you look at the landscape of the 2025 MLB season and the resigned attitude some are already adopting about what the Dodgers could do, it illuminates the fact that last year was probably the year to beat them. The Dodgers were built similarly in 2024, and yes, they went into the season as the presumptive favorites, but as the season played out and they navigated a slew of injuries, there were times when L.A. was vulnerable.
In one of the biggest moments of the postseason, the Dodgers were on the brink and on the verge of elimination in the NLDS. The San Diego Padres had a 2-1 lead over their California rivals with another game at home, but they couldn’t put them away.
By the time the Dodgers faced the Yankees in the World Series, a majority of their rotation was injured, and the starters who remained were running on fumes. Yet the Yankees couldn’t clean up their own play enough to beat them.
And now the Dodgers are going to be even better in 2025. With Shohei Ohtani’s return to the mound, that was always the realistic expectation. But after the team doubled down with an onslaught of offseason additions, it’s the overwhelming reality.
The Dodgers have been much maligned for their exorbitant spending this offseason, not only by some fans but also, interestingly enough, by representatives of other teams, including Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner. This is the same Steinbrenner who watched his father, George, spend like there was no tomorrow throughout the 37 years he owned the Yankees, en route to seven World Series titles during his tenure.
“It’s difficult for most of us owners to be able to do the kind of things that they’re doing,” Steinbrenner told reporters recently. “We’ll see if it pays off.”
He seems to be forgetting that it paid off for the Dodgers just last year, with their defeat of his Yankees in the World Series. But more importantly, his comments seem to miss a key component of all of this: If anyone is to blame for what some view as a Dodgers “spending problem,” it’s the other 29 MLB teams.
There were more than enough free agents to go around in this winter’s cycle. Just about any team could have signed one or two of Snell, Conforto, Hernández, Yates, Kim or Scott, and a few teams doing so could’ve prevented L.A. from reaching such a stratospheric level of spending. Simply put, other teams signing free agents means those free agents can’t join the Dodgers and help them get even better.
Yes, if you put all of L.A.’s moves together, it’s a massive haul, the likes of which few MLB organizations could match. But that haul is the result of many other teams choosing not to be aggressive in free agency and the Dodgers choosing to take advantage of their collective inactivity.
All the discourse in recent months about whether the Dodgers and their spending are good or bad for baseball is pretty ridiculous when you consider that no major team sport has more parity than baseball. MLB hasn’t seen a repeat champion since the Yankees won three straight World Series from 1998 to 2000. In this sport, spending the most money simply doesn’t guarantee that a team will be hoisting a trophy at the end of the year.
At the same time, spending at a significant level does give teams more opportunities to win. Since 2011, 14 teams have won the World Series, and of those teams, 11 have ranked in the Top 10 in MLB in payroll. Of those 11 teams, six were in the top five. Like it or not, spending correlates to success, and there’s plenty of evidence to back that up. Last year, the World Series featured the Yankees, who finished second in payroll, and the Dodgers, who were fifth.
And on paper, the 2025 Dodgers appear to be one of the best MLB teams ever assembled. Offensively, their lineup looks historically dominant, anchored by three MVPs in Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman, followed by maybe the most underrated player in baseball in Will Smith and with plenty of thump in the middle of the order from Hernández and Conforto.
After being a weakness last season due to the litany of injuries, the Dodgers’ rotation has the opportunity to be a strength. With Tyler Glasnow, Yamamoto and Ohtani joined by Sasaki, Snell and now Clayton Kershaw, this group has the potential to be just as dominant as the lineup. Not to mention, L.A. has a bullpen full of power arms.
At their full potential, the Dodgers could be headed for the regular-season wins record of 116 games, set by the Mariners in 2001. But this is baseball, and nothing is guaranteed. As the Dodgers learned last year, when it comes to health, depth can be here today and gone tomorrow. The success of the 2025 team will likely hinge on their ability to stay healthy and get the most out of their superior talent.
Still, even a worst-case scenario for L.A., in which injuries decimate the roster, might not be enough to stop them from making another serious run at the World Series. Last year, they won a championship with remnants of a starting staff. And unlike other teams that are just trying to reach the postseason, L.A.’s mindset through this offseason has been looking beyond that, to the goal of being strong and deep enough to win it all come October.
Were the Dodgers the big winners of this offseason? Certainly. Could the other teams in baseball have done more to prevent them from getting stronger? Absolutely. Should they have beaten the Dodgers last year when they had the chance? Probably.