Last year, the Los Angeles Dodgers clinched their 12th National League West title in the past 13 seasons en route to a second consecutive World Series championship.
They would have been a perfect 13-for-13 if not for the San Francisco Giants’ miracle run in 2021, but L.A. got the last laugh with a head-to-head victory in the NL Division Series that year.
The Dodgers are heavily favored to once again capture the NL West this upcoming season. While the rest of the league argues about L.A. ruining baseball, their rivals in the Bay Area spoke with admiration about what the Dodgers have accomplished.
Giants’ CEO Larry Baer called them a great competitor for his organization and baseball as a whole. He praised the Dodgers’ operation while also expressing his desire for San Francisco to be the one to dethrone them, he said on the Dan Patrick Show:
“Let’s just take all the sports: here we are at Super Bowl week, I think having a dragon to slay in a sport, if you go back in the NFL, once upon a time, it was the Cowboys, the 49ers had their run. That’s not all bad. The Yankees did that in baseball. You could say that’s the Dodgers now. Having a dragon to slay isn’t necessarily a bad thing for the sport. We want to beat the Dodgers, and we want to be at the top of the division. One day, we want to be the dragon to slay.
“Baseball is unpredictable as well. When we won three championships in 2010, ’12 and ’14, we weren’t predicted to win any of those years. And we didn’t have a top-five payroll any of those years. So hats off to the Dodgers organization, because they’ve done it with obviously high-priced players, but also they’ve done it with farm system and development.”
Baer joins MLB commissioner Rob Manfred, who has also praised the Dodgers’ accomplishments in baseball operations and business operations.
Additionally, Manfred has refuted various claims against the Dodgers, including that they are ruining baseball and must be breaking the rules or receiving special treatment.
Players including Bryce Harper and Manny Machado have also spoken out in support of the Dodgers’ spending.
Dodgers’ recent history vs Giants
Since losing the NL West to the Giants by a single game after going 9-10 against them in the regular season, the Dodgers have recovered quite nicely.
L.A. has a record of 49-28 versus the Giants since 2021 and finished with a winning record each season. The closest margin came in 2023, with the Dodgers winning seven of their 13 meetings.
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