Are the Dodgers Ruining Baseball?

In a word? No. The Los Angeles Dodgers are not ruining baseball, despite what you might be hearing from everyone who likes baseball in your orbit. Yankees fans, yes, I am looking at you. But I’m also looking at fans of the other 28 teams who feel sick to their stomach over the Dodgers 2024 World Series victory and their recent signing of free-agent pitcher and recent Cy Young Award winner, Blake Snell.

This article is a little bit of a rejoinder to the last article I wrote over a month ago (whoops! I was applying for law school, but we are so back baby) about the Chicago White Sox’s abysmal 2024. We looked at, and made fun of, a team that is terrible and has no intention to change that. Now, let’s look at a team that has dedicated itself to beating the snot out of the other 29 teams and talk about why we should be celebrating the Dodgers, not denigrating them. This is not a “they hate us, ‘cause they ain’t us” issue that often befalls the incumbent champion of any season—except for the 2019 Nationals, the 2023 Rangers, and a few other champions that no one has taken seriously—this is a fundamental misunderstanding of who has the best intention of their fans on their mind.

To start, we should revel in the 2024 Dodgers season, a tour de force brought to you by a team full of some of the best and most fun baseball players I have ever had the pleasure of watching. The chart below should look kind of familiar to those of you who have been reading this blog regularly (shoutout to all four of you guys, y’all make my day). This chart shows the Wins Above Replacement (WAR) accumulated by all 30 Major League Baseball (MLB) teams in the 2024 season. WAR, as a reminder, is a statistic that estimates the value each player contributes compared to their team over the most readily available replacement player (considered to be a high-level minor leaguer, or bottom-of-the-barrel major league talent). Basically, if you are a “replacement-level” player, you are easily replaceable by your team. 0-1 WAR is a bench player, 2-3 WAR is an average starter, 3-4 WAR is a good baseball player, 4-5 WAR is an All-Star, 5-6 WAR is a great player, and 6+ WAR is among the best players in baseball. This year, 11 players earned 6 or more WAR. As for team WAR, this is a cumulative effort, taking into account all of the WAR that everyone who played for the team accumulated. This year, the Dodgers led the pack with 39.6 WAR, 5.6 WAR ahead of the second-place Arizona Diamondbacks, and 46.3 WAR ahead of the last-place Chicago White Sox.

How did they accumulate all of this WAR? Well it was truly a team effort, eight of their players turned in seasons that were average or above. Only five of their position players accounted for less than 0 WAR, and combined they only amassed -1 total WAR. A mark that was bested by 3 INDIVIDUAL players on the 2024 White Sox. But what the Dodgers truly benefit from is an embarrassment of top-end talent. 7 of their players put up over 3 WAR, which means that about a third of their offensive roster was above average. Those seven players were Max Muncy, Miguel Rojas, Will Smith, Teoscar Hernandez, Freddie Freeman, Mookie Betts, and Shohei Ohtani. I want to talk about the last three names, who were also the best three on the team this season. Each of them has an argument of being some of the best players ever, and Shohei Ohtani—in the humble opinion of this blogger—is the best player to have ever lived.

Let’s start with Freddie Freeman. He’s your favorite baseball player’s favorite baseball player. Aside from having one of the best smiles in the game, he is just one of the best dudes in baseball. He joined the Dodgers in the 2021 offseason, signing a 6-year, $162 million deal. In his career, he has amassed 60.7 WAR in just 15 MLB seasons. That makes him the 14th-best primary first basemen in the history of the game. He’s an MVP, a two-time World Series Champion, and a sure bet to make the Hall of Fame. He has persevered through tragedy, having lost his mother to cancer when he was just 10, and having seen his son, Max, hospitalized with Guillain-Barre syndrome which resulted in paralysis earlier this year. He missed 15 games this year between his son’s illness and a severe ankle sprain suffered at the end of the 2024 season. His 4.7 WAR would have been 5.2 had he played a full 162 games season. He also absolutely mashed in the postseason, setting a record for most consecutive World Series games with a home run, including this absolute missile of a walk-off grand slam (sorry, Dad!).

Now onto my second favorite player in baseball, Marcus Allen “Mookie” Betts. Mookie Betts WAS my favorite player for most of my teenage years. He was the right fielder for the Boston Red Sox until I was 20, which was also my favorite team until I was 20. His departure in a trade is the reason that I am no longer a fan of any MLB team, simply because I refuse to root for the interests of billionaires over the players that make the game as fun as it is. I digress, Mookie Betts is one of the best outfielders in all of baseball. An MVP winner in 2018 and a six-time Gold Glove winner, he has long been considered to be one of the best defenders in the game—to say nothing of his exceptional bat. So he must have had a great season in right field for the Dodgers this year, right Max? Right? Right?! WRONG! Mookie Betts was primarily a shortstop for the Dodgers! He played 65 games at short, 18 at second, and 43 in right. If you’re good enough to do that math in your head, then this sentence doesn’t matter to you, but that is just 115 total games. Mookie Betts started just 115 games this year, appearing in 116, and still managed 4.8 WAR. Over a full 162 game season, that’s 6.7 WAR. However, before his June 16 injury, Betts was on pace for 7.5 WAR. Playing a position that he had played just 16 times in MLB prior to 2024, Betts was on an MVP pace. He also made some slick plays playing positions that were new to him at the highest level of the game.

Shohei, Shohei, Shohei. If you know me, you know that I LOVE talking about Shohei Ohtani. While he is deserving of a blog post of his own—and he will get one—I’m going to try my best to keep things brief here. In 2024, Shohei Ohtani—the greatest baseball player EVER—put up 9.2 WAR and won the National League MVP. That is the BEST primary Designated Hitter season ever. To get a little weedy with y’all, Designated Hitters pay a price on their WAR for not playing the field. Positions like shortstop, center field, and catcher are considered premium defensive positions and are given additional WAR to account for the reality that they are defense-first positions. As an offense-ONLY position, DHs are penalized for not playing the field. And with this penalty, Shohei Ohtani had the third-best season in the league in 2024. Why is that a big deal? Well, Shohei Ohtani is not normally only a DH, he is usually ALSO a pitcher! He normally does something that no other baseball player has ever done. He is a top 5 hitter and a top 5 pitcher in the game when he is healthy. No one, not Babe Ruth or any other player, has managed that level of two-sided production in the history of the game. He is singular. He is the best. This season, Shohei did something that only five other players in the history of baseball have managed to do: record a 40/40 season. This feat refers to a 40 homerun, 40 stolen base season, and is considered to be an extremely rare feat of speed and power. Usually, good homerun hitters do not steal bases. Usually, good base stealers do not hit home runs. But Shohei didn’t JUST do something that has only been done five other times in the history of baseball. He did something that no other player has ever done. He is the founding member of the 50/50 club. Swatting 54 homers while swiping 59 bags.

Of players who have hit at least 50 home runs in one season, Shohei has 35 more stolen bases than second place—occupied by Willie Mays, who is one of the only players I would ever consider as challenging Shohei for the GOAT title.

Of players that have stolen at least 50 bases in one season, Shohei has 13 more home runs than second place Ronald Acuna Jr. (who is one of the other five 40/40 players).

Okay, so the Dodgers have a bunch of great players, and? And they have paid handsomely to acquire these players. Of the three players that I mentioned at length in this article, all three of them made their MLB debut with a different team. The Dodgers traded for, and signed, these three MVPs. That is something the Dodgers have done better than any other team in baseball—they have gone out and signed or traded for the best players in baseball. Last offseason, they committed over $1 billion to Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto ($700 million of which is going to retain the talent of the best player who has ever lived). They are paying six players in excess of $27 million per year. 10 players are getting over $10 million next year. That includes pitcher Blake Snell, who they signed to a five year, $182 million contract on Tuesday, November 28. This sent baseball fans over the edge, complaining that the Dodgers are “buying wins,” or “paying for a championship.” To that, I genuinely ask “So what?”

Arguing that what the Dodgers are doing is wrong is to say that billionaires should hoard their money to artificially dampen salaries. The Dodgers are simply paying the market value for talent, if you don’t like it, don’t be mad at the Dodgers, be mad at YOUR TEAM’S OWNER. Let’s pretend, for a moment, that your best friend at work is offered a massive raise to go to another company to do the same job they do now after trying to negotiate with their current employer for a better salary. You wouldn’t blame your friend for leaving, I’m sure you would leave for a better salary to do the same job too! Would you blame the company that offered them more money than your current employer? That also seems far-fetched. You’d probably think “Dang, I would also love to work for that company.” The ones who deserve blame in this hypothetical are your current employer, who was unwilling to pay market rate for your friend’s labor.

By turning our collective fan-angst on the Dodgers, we are saying that what we need is corporate socialism. We are collectively blaming the Dodgers for awarding laborers with a closer estimation of their value than any of the other 29 teams are willing to offer. In truth, every single major league baseball player is underpaid relative to the value that they create for their employer. You are too, that’s how profit is made. That the Dodgers are more generous than the other teams is something that should be celebrated, more money for laborers is a good thing. It is something that we should all strive for. The Dodgers are better at passing surplus value to their employees than the other 29 teams, it is that simple. They are the example that every team should follow. “Well why don’t they?” you might be asking. And that is a fair question. Why don’t other teams do what the Dodgers do? Is it because they can’t afford it? No, it is not because they can’t afford it. Would you believe it if a billionaire told you that they could not afford a $250 million annual expense from their company that  earns, on average $378 million a year? They can’t afford a $128 million profit? That sounds dubious. That is to say nothing of the gradual increase in value that each team accrues every year, which has currently reached an average of $2.4 billion per team.

If you’re worried that the Dodgers are ruining baseball, you’re worried about the wrong thing. The people that own your favorite team can make your team better. Just as billionaires in the United States can afford to pay their fair share in taxes. It is the fault of decision makers far more powerful than any of us that billionaires are able to hoard their wealth in ways that continue to stratify society. Some billionaires are more willing to part with their dollars than other, contributing in a small way to the wealth transfer that our nation—and the world—so desperately needs. Those billionaires should be publicly encouraged and heralded. Those who bend the system to their wants are the ones we should vilify. If we don’t, they’ll get so used to our indifference—or praise—that they might run for President or try and cut the federal budget to a point where only they can afford to employ people, ensuring a cheap and desperate labor force where wages are depressed to the point where we can barely afford anything but the goods that the capitalist overlords produce.

The Dodgers are a capitalist organization. For that, they deserve blame. But they are the best example of capitalism available in the context of MLB teams. So let’s celebrate the Dodgers. While the rest of capitalism death-rattles its way through the second Trump Presidency, the Dodgers can be a fun escape for those of us unfortunate enough to have to deal with this bullshit.