Whicker: Could Dave Roberts rise to level of LA managers Alston and Lasorda?
Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts gets a lot of blame, but not a lot of credit despite a successful first 7 1/2 seasons.
July 19, 2023
By Mark Whicker
Canadian Baseball Network
Whenever something goes wrong in Dodgerland, the fan base lays it at the once-nimble feet of Dave Roberts, the manager.
This is not unusual in baseball or any other professional sport, of course. What is unusual is that Roberts catches so much flak in a place where things so seldom go wrong.
The criticisms sort of lay on top of each other. Either he’s a puppet of the computer jockeys who have filled up the old visiting Dodger Stadium clubhouse with their handiwork. Or his strings are being pulled by personnel CEO Andrew Friedman. In the next breath, Roberts is derided because he makes the wrong pitching choices in playoff games.
It’s reminiscent of the slings and arrows that are absorbed by President Biden. Either he’s so senile that he can’t find his shoes, or he’s a ruthlessly cunning mastermind of an international conspiracy. Neither is necessarily true. Both cannot be.
Roberts took over the Dodgers in 2016 after Don Mattingly launched himself to Miami by demanding more years than the Dodgers wanted to give him. So this is his eighth season. In that time the Dodgers have played in three World Series, winning one, and won all but one National League West championship. They have won 100 or more games four times. Before 2016, they had won 100 or more games only six times, going back to the Brooklyn Superbas of 1899.
At this writing, they are 287 games over .500 with Roberts managing, and he is fifth all-time with a winning percentage of .628.
For the first time in this period, the Dodgers weren’t the widespread favorites to win the N.L. West in 2023. San Diego had eliminated them in last year’s Division Series and had won one of their many winter championships by inflating their roster. The Padres have been a model franchise right up until the moment when they are required to actually play. They find themselves 10 1/2 games out of first place, which, again, is occupied by the Dodgers.
In fact, the Dodgers are 16 games over .500 and have the second best record in the National League.
Given those facts, one might assume that everything has fallen nicely into place. Instead, the Dodgers lost shortstop Gavin Lux in spring training. They already knew they wouldn’t have Walker Buehler, their best big-game pitcher. Then they lost pitcher Dustin May for the season. Clayton Kershaw, the only Dodger who was around when Roberts was hired, started brilliantly but is out until August, and Julio Urias, who won 37 games in 2021-22, missed all of June. Noah Syndergaard was a long shot who, in his halting starts, demonstrated why.
The Dodgers desperately needed a young pitcher to hit and stick, and then they needed a couple, but only Bobby Miller seems October-worthy at this point. At the All-Star break the Dodger staff ranked 11th in ERA and eighth in WHIP among N.L. teams.
They also were counting on second baseman Miguel Vargas making the jump, but he is back in the minors.
They once had Corey Seager and then Trea Turner as their shortstops, and lost them both to free agency. Justin Turner, for years the core of their clubhouse and the author of so many critical hits, is in Boston and doing approximately the same things he did in L.A. Alex Verdugo is also in Boston and has become one of the A.L.’s best players, and Kenley Jansen, the Dodgers’ all-time closer, is there with him, and still cranking out saves.
Dean Kremer has been one of the best pitchers for Baltimore in its pursuit of Tampa Bay in the A.L. East, and the Dodgers surrendered him as part of their 2018 deadline trade for Manny Machado, who signed with the Padres in 2019.
Umpire Greg Gibson and Roberts argue after the bench cleared in a game against rival San Diego.
Cody Bellinger, the former Rookie of the Year and MVP who then fell into slumps that the Dodgers’ committee of batting coaches couldn’t help him solve, is having something of a revival with the Cubs.
All organizations must shed their skin at some point, and the good ones have another layer underneath. The Dodgers have compensated with a lethal leadoff combination of Mookie Betts, who came over in the trade that sent Verdugo east, and Freddie Freeman, perhaps the most sophisticated hitter in baseball. Betts has not only crushed 27 home runs, he has eagerly filled in at second base and shortstop. Atlanta’s Ronald Acuna Jr. seems fated to win the MVP, but in the truest sense of the award Betts deserves major consideration, just as Detroit’s Miguel Cabrera did in 2012 when he willingly moved off first base and played third to make room for Prince Fielder.
Dodger management also whisked J.D. Martinez out of Boston to be the DH. He, Will Smith and Max Muncy join Betts and Freeman to form a massive gauntlet. Overall, it was a slick offseason for Friedman, who managed to carve out some salary room in case the Dodgers want to give Shohei Ohtani GDP money in the off-season.
But there’s something in the clubhouse and the dugout that goes beyond mere personnel. Even without J. Turner and the other architects of this time in Dodger history, there’s a professionalism and tranquility that other clubs lack. This particular team isn’t as loaded as the 2017 or 2021 or 2022 editions, but it might be more versatile offensively, more capable of hitting line-to-line, and less wedded to the home run. It also is 15-7 against Atlanta, Baltimore, Tampa Bay, Philadelphia, San Diego and Houston.
Through it all, Roberts is still there, still the same, still optimistic, still patient when patience is required and decisive when change must be made. The Dodgers once had a manager who wasn’t the peoples’ choice but won anyway. Walter Alston also was overshadowed by the talent acquisition system around him. Alston had a major league playing career that consisted of one at-bat, and most Dodger failures were laid at his feet, by fans and also his own coaches and players. He also functioned on one-year contracts from his first season (1954) until his finale (1976), 23 years all told.
Alston was the manager when the Dodgers’ won their first four World Series championships.
They’ve only won seven in their history. Although the much louder regime of Tommy Lasorda followed him, Alston’s reputation got better with each season of his retirement, and he wound up in the Hall of Fame. So did Lasorda. If the next 7 1/2 years are like these 7 1/2, Roberts has a chance to join them someday. The only sure way to silence opinions is to outlast them, and watch them trail off, in search of the next target.