Los Angeles Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman confirmed manager Dave Roberts is returning for the 2024 season and said he does not anticipate any changes to the coaching staff.
Friedman has been steadfast in his public support of Roberts since he was hired as manager before the 2016 season, and put the Dodgers’ latest shortcomings in the postseason on the entire organization. Friedman called getting eliminated from the 2022 National League Division Series an “organizational failure” and said that applied this October as well.
“The collective effort of this group and the culture, not just, ‘Hey, everyone gets along.’ But going through the clubhouse before a game and watching how everyone is focused, all of our players, on how to try and win a game,” Friedman explained during a press conference from Dodger Stadium to conclude the 2023 season.
“The one thing I can say with absolute certainty — and there aren’t a lot of things I can do that about as we postmortem — is it was certainly not from a lack of effort.
“Watching the way these guys prepared, cared, did everything could to put themselves in the best position to go out and have success. Now, we didn’t do it, and that is ultimately what matters most. So it’s figuring out from that. But I think Doc and our coaching staff did an incredible job this year. And none of us did a good job for those three games against Arizona.”
When further pressed on the Dodgers maintaining the status quo with Roberts and organization as a whole moving forward, Friedman elaborated on his belief making a change would not necessarily amount to improvement.
“Organizational failure means it’s on all of us and we all had a hand in it. If this were one person or a small collection of people, in my estimation, then we would make changes,” he said.
“We just wouldn’t do it to say, ‘Look, we made changes,’ and try to cover up what has happened. Instead, we have a lot of extremely disappointed, angry people who are all going to work really hard together to avoid being in this position again next year.
“With the talent, with how much they care, their work ethic, how much they care about these fans and doing everything we can to win a championship in 2024, felt like making a change would be for the sake of it instead of actually bringing better and more talented people in.”
Dave Roberts contract
The Dodgers signed Roberts to a three-year contract extension in March 2022 that runs through the 2025 season.
Roberts has the best winning percentage (.630) among all managers in MLB history (minimum 315 games). It’s bested only by Negro League managers Bullet Rogan (.698), Vic Harris (.663) and Rube Foster (.633).
Roberts has guided the Dodgers to seven National League West titles, two NL pennants and one World Series championship in three appearances during his eight seasons as manager.
Have you subscribed to the Dodger Blue YouTube channel? Be sure to ring the notification bell to watch player interviews, participate in shows and giveaways, and stay up to date on all Dodgers news and rumors!
