If we assume that the Los Angeles Dodgers have to make a decision between pursuing pitching or hitting - and I reject this assumption - let’s look at what they have in terms of pitching.
Julio Urias (175 innings, career high 185 innings)
Tony Gonsolin (130 innings, a career high)
Dustin May (30 innings coming off Tommy John, career high of 56 innings)
That’s a career-high total of 350 innings locked in. That’s not enough from the absolute “these are starters” list.
It’s a shortlist of locked in, full go starters. Let’s add in one:
Walker Buehler (Tommy John surgery in August, with flexor tendon issues. Let’s assume he’s lost for 2023.)
All this assumes that Clayton Kershaw will walk away. Ignore that he’s worth just slightly more than 120 innings and is more than likely to come back on a one-year deal that’s relatively fair to both sides, rather than going to Texas, which is the only other place he’ll go. (No, seriously.) Let’s hold those 120 innings in reserve, as I have a feeling Kershaw may wait until late, and that it won’t really be his decision where he goes. The Dodgers may end up with enough innings that they don’t need him, and then he’ll need to decide whether or not he wants to wear another uniform or be defined by Vin Scully’s call. Not a bad choice, mind you. (EDIT: A one-year deal was reported as close last week, but it hasn’t been finalized. I’m assuming he’ll come back, hence the “more than likely”, but there’s still the chance the Dodgers’ deal doesn’t get done. I could have been more clear here.)
Oh that other guy? He’s never pitching again, so ignore him, as he deserves.
Dropping Bobby Miller in is easy. He was at Triple-A, dominated at times, but he only went 110 innings overall last year, no matter how good they were. Ryan Pepiot was much the same, with 120 innings, including 36 in the bigs, all relatively good statistically. It would be very, very easy to project these two into a big league rotation, but taking them much beyond 150 innings would be a stretch. In the best case, you have one and half functional starters between these two. You’d need May to go to 150 as well, plus Gonsolin going there or beyond to have all five. That doesn’t account for injuries, so let’s say the Dodgers will need a six and seven at the ready.
Gavin Stone came up to Triple-A late in the season, so let’s assume he could do the same with MLB. He can season a bit in Oklahoma City, then give another 50 innings to the big club at some point in the late summer. Reasonable, or at the least, he could fill in with some spot starts. Nick Nastrini got bumped up to Double-A when Stone went to Triple-A. Let’s shrug and give them the same career path, so it’s possible he could do a spot start or two the way Miller did in ‘22.
The downside is that there’s not much else between there and the Emmet Sheehans and Nick Frassos of the world, still too raw at the A-ball levels. The Dodgers don’t have much in the way of ready prospects, but this isn’t bad. If the team were to find a Tyler Anderson, Andrew Heaney or two, letting Mark Prior squeeze the most out of them, they could find guys in the minor league free agent market or the low end of the major league market.
Who’s this? Well the market has a ton of low end starters and the Dodgers aren’t throwing darts. If they’re using the things I think they are (hi, Z!) they’ll look at Ryan Yarbrough, Ross Stripling, and Chad Kohl, all at bargain prices. Sign all three and it will cost less than an arb-eligible starter and one is likely to take for 120 to 150 innings. These are the “fill in” innings that get the staff towards 900, that let Stone and Nastrini spend more time in Oklahoma City than Los Angeles, in a good way.
Is a rotation made up this way - May, Urias, Gonsolin, Miller, and a low-end free agent, plus Stone and Nastrini on the back end? That’s a very young rotation, perhaps susceptible to injury and a bit of luck balancing, but it’s still pretty solid. If they add in Clayton Kershaw, now we’re talking about a really good, but untraditional rotation that probably isn’t getting more than 150 innings out of anyone, aside from Urias.
That’s the absolute minimum they’ll do. If they lose Kershaw, they’ll use that money on someone who won’t be as good, but could be more stable, which makes using the really young end of the rotation less necessary, hopefully. It also fits with the strengths of the team, which is finding lower-end guys who can fit in with a young core, then coaching them up and putting them in the right situations. You know, analytics, plus Mark Prior.
Yes, the Dodgers could go out and splash some of those big bucks on a big buck free agent and still have plenty to fill in spots, or to go after Aaron Judge if they felt like it (or at least bid up what the Giants have to spend for him.) I just reject the idea that they have to. There’s a lot of paths to success for the Dodgers, which is exactly what Andrew Friedman wants every year.
I thought the dodgers and Kershaw had already agreed to terms. Did I imagine it?