The Los Angeles Dodgers may be on the verge of clinching a seventh consecutive National League West title and in the midst of another pennant race, but that doesn’t mean players can’t have other hobbies outside of baseball.
As is the case with a lot of sports fans this time of the year, the Dodgers recently held their annual team fantasy football draft. Cody Bellinger has been entertaining with his play on the field all season, but it was actually his teammates that got a laugh at his expense during the fantasy draft.
Bellinger was not aware there was an online portion to this year’s draft and he was forced to autoselect Dallas Cowboys running back Ezequiel Elliott in the first round.
Bellinger wanted — and shouted for — Houston Texans wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins with his first-round pick, then ran out of time to make it official online. Fortunately for the NL MVP candidate, Elliott has since signed a contract extension and will be on the field this season.
Meanwhile, when asked how he felt about the team he drafted, Joc Pederson expressed confidence and even pegged the league’s commissioner, Walker Buehler, as having the worst team, as seen on SportsNet LA:
“I’m not going to throw out any shame on anyone but I think it’s pretty obvious I had the best draft. I was the most prepared, I got the best players, they’re going to perform well, I’m going to treat them well as a GM and it’s going to be a good year. Well, you know who had a bad draft? Walker Buehler had a really bad draft. … Everyone else was good.”
It comes as no surprise that Buehler disagreed with that sentiment. He believes it is Pederson and Bellinger with the worst teams:
“I think Belli had the worst draft and Joc had the second-worst draft, and I think my team is in the upper-echelon. … [Bellinger] took Matt Ryan in the sixth round.”
The league’s reigning champions are Clayton Kershaw and Ross Stripling, and former general manager Farhan Zaidi won it the two years before that. So Pederson, Buehler and Bellinger will all be looking for their first title this season.
The same can be said for the Dodgers on the field. If they are able finally to get over the hump and win the World Series, it will be the organization’s first since 1988.
