Heading into the offseason the Los Angeles Dodgers faced several decisions with their personnel, namely Clayton Kershaw and manager Dave Roberts. Despite the similarities, the organization sat in different chairs with both.
Kershaw held a player option that would allow him to forfeit the remaining two years and $65 million on his contract in favor of reaching free agency for the first time in his career. He and the Dodgers agreed to a three-year, $93 million extension after pushing back the deadline for his decision on the opt-out clause.
Meanwhile, the Dodgers hold a club option on Roberts for the 2019 season. The two parties were said to have discussed an extension during Spring Training before ultimately deciding to table the talks in favor of focusing on the 2018 campaign.
Although the Dodgers and Roberts aren’t necessarily on the verge of agreeing to an extension as Wednesday’s deadline looms, the expectation is one will be finalized, per Joel Sherman of The New York Post:
The Dodger have until Wednesday — 10 days after the World Series — to decide on the 2019 option of manager Dave Roberts. The sides, though, continued to talk about a long-term extension instead. There was no deal imminent early in the day Monday, but there was optimism expressed that an extension would ultimately be forged.
Roberts and Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman have long maintained there wasn’t any concern or animosity over an extension not yet being in place. Speaking at an end-of-season press conference, Friedman dismissed the notion there was anything to read of the situation.
Dodgers general manager Farhan Zaidi, who may soon find himself leading the San Francisco Giants front office, reiterated the expectation was to sign Roberts to a long-term extension.
