As their division rivals run up offseason bills approaching $1 billion combined, the Dodgers on Wednesday added something the Padres and Giants couldn’t: a Norse god.
Noah Syndergaard might not be an actual mythical figure capable of controlling thunder and lightning. But he once resembled one on the pitching mound, and the Dodgers are banking $13 million in guaranteed salary (plus another $1.5 million in potential incentives) that their track record of accessing unlocked potential in overlooked arms can ring true yet again and help Thor rediscover the hammer that once made him among the best pitchers in the game.
On its own, this feels like a quintessential Dodgers move. The team needed starting pitching reinforcements after Tyler Anderson and Andrew Heaney left for the Angels and Rangers, respectively, this winter. Each of those players followed a path last season similar to what the team is hoping to replicate with Syndergaard in 2023.
Before landing in Los Angeles, Anderson was an established if unspectacular starter. He had a career 4.62 ERA heading into 2022, earning a one-year, $8 million deal to join the Dodgers. Once there, he reworked the grip on his changeup to immediate success, throwing the pitch more often and with much stronger results than the previous year. The end result was a 2.57 ERA across 178 ⅔ innings and his first All-Star selection, with the lefthander ranking among the league’s best in generating soft contact and avoiding walks.
Heaney’s 2022 story was also a successful one. The team tapped into the potential of Heaney’s slider, making him one of the game’s premier swing-and-miss arms. He still struggled with giving up home runs and only managed 14 starts due to injury, but he set new career bests in strikeout rate (35.5%) and put up a 3.10 ERA to earn himself a two-year, $25 million contract from Texas last week.
If the Dodgers can hone in on a single area of improvement for Syndergaard to experience the type of resurgence Anderson and Heaney did, it will likely come in the form of added velocity. Pitching basically for the first time since 2019 after undergoing Tommy John surgery, Syndergaard was certainly nowhere near his old self in ‘22. But he managed well enough and stayed healthy, putting up a respectable 3.94 ERA over 134 ⅔ innings despite clocking in 4-5 miles per hour slower on his average fastball and slider velocity compared to what it was during his peak years. The 30-year-old Syndergaard wouldn’t be the first Dodgers pitcher to start throwing harder after joining the club, and that could be the key ingredient for him to rediscover his form.
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Syndergaard’s dependability will be counted on in light of the aforementioned departures. Los Angeles currently slots Clayton Kershaw, Julio Urías, Tony Gonsolin and Dustin May in its rotation. Getting more depth was a necessity given Kershaw’s recent track record (22 starts in each of the past two years) and May’s still-fresh return from Tommy John surgery himself last season. For that reason alone, adding a veteran arm with a seemingly reliable baseline of “good enough” for a reasonable cost is a prudent move by a front office that’s made a habit out of them over the past several years.
Taking a broader look at the team’s offseason approach, though, and it’s easy to start tapping your foot in anticipation. The Dodgers won a franchise record 111 games last year yet, as has become a theme during their decade-long run of regular season dominance, fell disappointingly short in the playoffs. Before Syndergaard’s signing, the only player Los Angeles had added in free agency on a major-league deal was Shelby Miller on a one-year, $1.5 million contract (though the team also gave Kershaw $20 million to return for 2023). Meanwhile, key contributors Trea Turner, Anderson, Heaney, Chris Martin and Cody Bellinger have signed elsewhere.
Across the division, meanwhile, the spending has reached a new stratosphere. The Giants made one of the biggest splashes of the offseason with their 13-year, $350 million deal to bring in Carlos Correa. They’ve also added Mitch Haniger, Sean Manaea and Ross Stripling while retaining Joc Pederson, bringing their spending total this winter to a whopping $463 million.
The Padres haven’t run up quite as high of a bill, but they’ve still committed to spending $352 million on Xander Bogaerts and re-signed pitchers Robert Suarez and Nick Martinez. That may or may not offset losses of Josh Bell, Manaea and Mike Clevinger, or the potential departures of the still-unsigned Jurickson Profar and Brandon Drury. But it feels notable that, of the four premier free agent shortstops in this class, one has left the Dodgers and two have joined their division rivals.
Given how quickly things move in the offseason, any bemoaning that the Dodgers aren’t doing enough could be rendered moot at any time. There are still pressing needs on the roster, particularly at shortstop and in the outfield. And the potential available difference-makers are becoming scarce, though not completely gone (paging Dansby Swanson). Just as Wednesday’s move was very Dodgers-esque, it would also be on-brand for the team to make a big splash nobody sees coming.
Six or seven months from now, we could all be marveling at how Syndergaard has turned back the clock five years and the Dodgers have worked their magic again. Even so, this move feels more like a preamble than a final note in an offseason growing increasingly urgent with each passing mega-deal from a rival club.
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