Bryce Eldridge<\/a> said Saturday before the Giants\u2019 first stop of their FanFest Tour. \u201cBeing their rivals, I take pride in wanting to beat them and beat the best. To be the best, you\u2019ve got to beat the best. I know that\u2019s an old saying, but it\u2019s the truth. You got to go up against the best competition, and thankfully, our division is very good and that\u2019s going to make us that much better.\u201d<\/p>\nAdded infielder Casey Schmitt: \u201cThey got another great player, but we\u2019ve got good players too. I think we just keep the course and just play our game and not worry about who\u2019s in the other dugout.\u201d<\/p>\n
Prior to Tucker, the Dodgers\u2019 \u201conly\u201d major move of the offseason was signing three-time All-Star closer Edwin D\u00edaz to a three-year, $69 million deal. The team\u2019s bullpen was a legitimate weakness in the postseason, so they went out and acquired the best high-leverage reliever on the market (and his elite walk-out song).<\/p>\n
That addition, to be sure, wasn\u2019t peanuts. At $23 million per season, D\u00edaz set the record for the highest average annual value by a reliever. But D\u00edaz is just that: a reliever. If healthy, he\u2019ll pitch around 65 innings next season.<\/p>\n
But Tucker? That\u2019s another stratosphere of move.<\/p>\n
The Dodgers\u2019 outfield was projected to be middle-of-the-pack, but their offense wasn\u2019t exactly starved for firepower. Before adding Tucker, Los Angeles was already anchored by a trio of future Hall of Famers in four-time MVP Shohei Ohtani and one-time MVPs Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman. That\u2019s nothing to say of Will Smith, Max Muncy and Teoscar Hern\u00e1ndez, all of whom have been All-Stars.<\/p>\n
Last season, the Dodgers led the National League in home runs (244), runs (825) and OPS (.768). Now, they\u2019re adding a player who is averaging about 27 homers and 21 steals with a .878 OPS over the last five seasons.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s also the larger context of the sport to consider with this move.<\/p>\n
Major League Baseball is headed towards a lockout when the collective-bargaining agreement expires on Dec. 1. The Dodgers\u2019 signing of Tucker probably didn\u2019t increase the already high odds of a lockout, but it didn\u2019t exactly quiet the public outcry for a salary cap, the primary issue of the impending labor dispute.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Tucker (addition) adds to their lineup,\u201d said new manager Tony Vitello. \u201cBy nature, you don\u2019t really have to follow the offseason closely to know that their organization \u2014\u00a0and a couple others \u2014\u00a0are going to spend a lot of money. The biggest thing I know \u2026 is I\u2019m wearing orange and black. I\u2019m looking at some guys that I\u2019m excited to work with that are wearing orange and black.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll see who shows up at spring training because there\u2019s a few days between now and then. \u2026 But the group that we have, I know the level of excitement will be incredibly high. You could argue dollars and cents, talent and things like that, but I think there\u2019s a fresh air with some of the changes that we need to capitalize on.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE \u2014 The Los Angeles Dodgers were having a quiet offseason by their lofty standards. Then, they…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2399],"tags":[5,5776,2178,138,24,4245,161,7939,5774,5775,853,4,5777,378,5778,66,185],"class_list":["post-526448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-chicago-cubs","tag-baseball","tag-bay-area","tag-california","tag-chicago","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-chicagocubs","tag-cubs","tag-giants-alert","tag-giants-hq","tag-inside-sports","tag-latest-headlines","tag-mlb","tag-peninsula","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-county","tag-san-francisco-giants","tag-sports"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115916829046336672","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=526448"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526448\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=526448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=526448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=526448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}