Whicker: Dodgers masters of developing MLB pitchers
Former Los Angeles Dodgers pitching prospect Devin Smeltzer is 4-2 with a 3.92 ERA with the Minnesota Twins this season.
July 11, 2022
By Mark Whicker
Canadian Baseball Network
Check out this rotation:
— Devin Smeltzer (pictured), Minnesota, 4-2 with a 3.92 ERA and a 1.156 WHIP.
— Dean Kremer, Baltimore, 4-1 with a 2.15 ERA in seven starts.
— Frankie Montas, Oakland, 3-9 with a 3.26 ERA and a 1.086 WHIP. Also 100 strikeouts in 96 2/3 innings.
— Josiah Gray, Washington, 7-5 with a 4.14 ERA and 10.2 strikeouts per nine innings.
— Kenta Maeda, Minnesota, recuperating from Tommy John surgery but the A.L. Cy Young Award runner-up in 2020.
This isn’t championship stuff. But it’s a better rotation than some teams have. It is also constructed exclusively of pitchers the Los Angeles Dodgers have traded.
If you need sparkplugs, you don’t go to Nordstrom Rack. If you need pitchers, you answer the phone in one ring when you see “Andrew Friedman” on the screen, because the Dodgers find them, develop them and win with them at a rate that nobody else can match.
Smeltzer came to the Twins as part of the package for Brian Dozier in 2018. Montas went to Oakland in a deal that brought Rich Hill and Josh Reddick to what became the 2017 National League champs.
Kremer was in the cargo bin that landed in Baltimore when the Dodgers acquired Manny Machado at the 2018 trade deadline. Gray and catcher Keibert Ruiz, both premium prospects, were shipped to Washington last summer as Max Scherzer and Trea Turner came west.
Maeda, who did good work for the Dodgers as a starter and reliever, was dispatched to Minnesota in the deal that brought reliever Brusdar Graterol before the 2021 season.
Do the Dodgers regret any of this?
Certainly not, even though Machado, Scherzer, Hill, and Dozier are no longer on hand. The deal that hurts is the one that brought Josh Fields from Houston in exchange for Yordan Alvarez, the current A.L. leader in slugging percentage and OPS. Makes you want to punch a trashcan.
But their knack for judging, projecting and developing arms is the foundational reason why they’ve been the kings of the regular season since 2017. The 2016 draft is Exhibit A.
— First-round pick Jordan Sheffield is hurt this year but had a 1.091 WHIP in Colorado’s bullpen last year.
— Second-round pick Mitch White has been the five-and-fly fifth starter for the Dodgers and has a 1.150 WHIP in those starts.
— Third-round pick Dustin May is coming back from Tommy John. In his first 42 major league games, his WHIP is 1.065.
— The fourth-round pick was Smeltzer.
— The fifth-round pick was Andre Scrubb, who has pitched 38 major league games for Houston.
— The ninth-round pick is Tony Gonsolin. More on him later.
— The 12th-round pick was Graham Ashcraft, who didn’t sign. The Reds got him three years later and he is 4-2 as a starter.
— The 14th-round pick was Kremer.
— The 23rd-round pick was Bailey Ober, the 6-foot-9 righthander who didn’t sign then but joined the Twins three years later. He is 1-2, 4.14 with Minnesota this year and has given up only two homers in 32 1/3 innings.
Although the Dodgers are 56-29 and continue to slap around the Padres whenever they feel inclined, their trade-deadline bazaar will be open. Walker Buehler had a bone spur removed and is tentatively slated to return in late August or early September. That leaves a postseason rotation of Gonsolin, Clayton Kershaw, Julio Urias and Tyler Anderson. That’s perfectly fine, but when there’s no satisfaction short of a world championship, general manager Friedman will certainly seek an upgrade: Cincinnati’s Luis Castillo, the Angels’ Noah Syndergaard or even Montas if he can overcome shoulder inflammation.
If you’re the Dodgers you look at life in terms of Game 1 and 2 postseason starters. Scherzer is back with the Mets and Jacob deGrom is headed that way. The Braves have Max Fried and either Kyle Wright or Spencer Strider. The Brewers have Corbin Burnes and Brandon Woodruff. The Dodgers will need to match all of that.
Friedman is just as likely to look at a bullpen that leads the league in WHIP but is seventh in strikeouts. Would the Tigers, halfway to nowhere once again, give up closer Gregory Soto? Would Kansas City discuss Scott Barlow, and would the Cubs put a price tag on David Robertson?
The reason all of these things, and more, are possible is that the bottom-feeding clubs know the Dodgers will return fair value. Maybe Ryan Pepiot and Bobby Miller, the Next Starters, aren’t available but the Dodgers have four of Baseball America’s Top 50 prospects.
Gonsolin could have been in the picture window, once upon a time. He was cast in several roles as he broke in with the Dodgers. He brought four viable pitches to the rotation, and he and the Dodgers tinkered with them and refined them and found that the splitter and the slider were the most lethal, but that all of them worked in the strike zone.
The results, in 2022, are blinkworthy. Gonsolin is 11-0 with a 1.54 ERA. He leads the N.L. in wins (with Justin Verlander), WHIP and ERA and the Dodgers are 13-3 when he starts. Considering Kershaw’s earlier absence and Buehler’s continuing one, Gonsolin might be a better choice for MVP than Cy Young.
Gonsolin was not the marquee pitcher at St. Mary’s College. Burnes, the 2021 N.L. Cy Young winner, was. Gonsolin came from Vacaville, Ca., with hopes of playing the outfield, but when coach Eric Valenzuela took over and found an empty bullpen, he asked for volunteers. Gonsolin raised his hand, but still only started six games as a senior (he wasn’t drafted as a junior). Then he began ingesting the Dogers’ special sauce.
He also would be a natural to start the All-Star Game in Dodger Stadium next Tuesday. There is heavy sentiment to let Kershaw do that, to recognize his meritorious service since 2008. But Dave Roberts doesn’t make that call. Atlanta manager Brian Snitker does, and he might lean toward Fried, who is 49-20 lifetime and 9-2 this year. He went to Harvard-Westlake High, which is 19 miles from Dodger Stadium.
(Note to Alex Rodriguez: It’s not Westlake-Harvard.)