The Los Angeles Dodgers officially announced their roster for the National League Division Series with the Atlanta Braves, carrying 13 position players and 12 pitchers, which was the case in last year’s first round as well.
At the Dodgers’ workout ahead of the series on Wednesday, manager Dave Roberts discussed how difficult it was for him and his staff to decide on a 25-man roster considering all 40 players on the September roster contributed at one point or another and it worthy of a spot.
“It’s kind of coming to a head now where you have a lot of good players that you can kind of match up and now when you gotta pare it down to 25,” he said. “This is where the conversations are really debated, and there’s going to be some difficult conversations.”
Unlike years past, the Dodgers’ four-man starting rotation is essentially set, so there wasn’t anything unexpected. The big surprise though was the decision to start Hyun-Jin Ryu in Game 1 and Clayton Kershaw in Game 2. Kershaw has started on short rest in the past, but that should not be the case in this year’s NLDS.
The tough decisions likely came in the bullpen, where the Dodgers ended up having a ton of depth after getting some relievers back from injury.
A complete breakdown of the Dodgers’ NLDS roster included below. Players are listed alphabetically in each position group.
Starting pitchers (4): Walker Buehler, Rich Hill, Clayton Kershaw, Hyun-Jin Ryu
Relief pitchers (8): Scott Alexander, Pedro Baez, Caleb Ferguson, Dylan Floro, Kenley Jansen, Ryan Madson, Kenta Maeda, Alex Wood
Catchers (2): Austin Barnes, Yasmani Grandal
Infielders (6): Brian Dozier, David Freese, Kiké Hernandez, Manny Machado, Max Muncy, Justin Turner
Outfielders (5): Cody Bellinger, Matt Kemp, Joc Pederson, Yasiel Puig, Chris Taylor
Many of the relievers that did not make the roster like John Axford, J.T. Chargois, Tony Cingrani, Josh Fields, Zac Rosscup and Ross Stripling will likely be headed to the team’s Spring Training facility for ‘Stay Hot Camp’ in case they are needed in this series due to an injury or to potentially make the roster in a later round.
Position players like Kyle Farmer, Andrew Toles, Chase Utley and Alex Verdugo could be headed there as well. With Utley set to retire at the end of the season, he very well could have already played the final game of his career.
