The Dodgers are the Avengers of baseball. They always get stronger even after winning.
Blake Snell’s first real opportunity to test the market during MLB free agency did not go exactly as planned. In fact, it was a disaster. There is no doubt that he is much more excited this time around with how everything worked out.
The two-time Cy Young award winner in both the American and National Leagues agreed to a five-year, $182 million deal with the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday night, according to ESPN’s insider Jeff Passan.
Snell did not have a qualifying offer this year after saying thanks, but no thanks in 2023, so in this particular case, his signing will not cost his new team a draft pick. The deal comes after a campaign filled with peaks and valleys with the San Francisco Giants, but one that definitely ended with a bang on Snell’s side.
At the beginning of July, he was falling off a cliff with an inflated 9.51 ERA through six starts and had missed significant time due to two stints on the injured list. And then, as he often does, Snell locked in and got better in the second half. After returning to the mound from the IL on July 9, he was nearly unhittable, posting a dazzling 1.23 ERA over his final 14 starts with 114 strikeouts in 80 1/3 innings of work. Batters had no luck against his electric stuff, hitting .123/.211/.171 against him.
Thanks to that extended stretch, Snell went into this offseason on a high note as one of the most sought after free-agent starting arms and came in at No. 6 on Yahoo Sports’ list of this winter’s free agents. Snell wasted hardly any time at all finding a new home for his talents, making the move from northern to southern California and who could fault him, considering how last offseason played out. Now, he will get to be a part of the reigning World Series champions.
Snell not only found a deal for himself 112 days earlier than he did last offseason, he partnered with what is shaping up to be an incredible rotation in the ‘City of Angels’, Los Angeles.
Despite their success in 2024 and winning the ultimate prize over the New York Yankees, the Dodgers entered the offseason with the rotation as a clear need, since Jack Flaherty and Walker Buehler, two of their three real starting pitchers during their playoff run, entered free agency themselves. Snell is a bigger name and has more accomplishments on his resume than either.
Embed from Getty ImagesThe Dodgers’ rotation for 2025, when all are healthy, now projects as something like Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Shohei Ohtani, Tyler Glasnow and Clayton Kershaw, assuming the latter follows through on his stated intent to re-sign with the team. Tony Gonsolin, Dustin May and Emmet Sheehan are also expected to return after being on the shelf for the entire 2024 season with various injuries.
It is a dangerous collection of pitching talent, but that “when healthy” requirement is an enormous one for the Dodgers. Their last two playoff teams have seen them enter the postseason with a very shaky pitching staff. Every player listed above missed a chunk of time with injuries last season, and the Dodgers are responding by looking for even more depth in that department.
The part that scares the other teams around the league is that the Dodgers probably are not done. Corbin Burnes and Max Fried might be a little too rich for their blood now, but a reunion with Buehler or Flaherty does not seem out of the question. And, of course, there is the looming possibility of Roki Sasaki joining them on an outrageously small deal.
Rewind the clock to the start of the 2023-24 MLB offseason. Snell was named the winner of the 2023 NL Cy Young Award, making him one of 22 pitchers in the history of baseball to win the award multiple times. He also entered free agency for the first time in his career, with an endless supply of suitors.
Snell expected a large and lucrative contract, to the point that he reportedly turned down a six-year, $150 million offer from the New York Yankees. His super-agent, Scott Boras, is known for playing poker and not showing his hand, waiting out teams to get the best possible deal, but no such deal came.
By the time spring training rolled around, Snell did not have a place to call home, nor did fellow Boras clients Cody Bellinger, Matt Chapman or Jordan Montgomery. It was an embarrassing situation for the agent and his players, and it resulted in them all taking short-term deals in late February and early March. In Snell’s case, he landed with the Giants on a two-year, $62 million contract with an opt-out after the first year, which he exercised.
For all of his talent, Snell had enough red flags that teams were nervous and apprehensive about promising him $200 million plus. He was an older free agent at 30 years old, for one, and his consistency and durability issues are common knowledge. He has thrown more than 130 innings in a season only twice in his career, and he led MLB in a dubious stat, walks in 2023.
This most recent season did not do much to raise his stock and change the minds of the powers that be thought about him around the league, as he was awful and injured, then Cy Young-worthy. But good things sometimes come to the people who are aggressive and know what they want.
