Yes, the Dodgers missed out on Zack Greinke and all of the other top-line starters who were free agents, but while they whiffed (better word: passed) on high-end quality, they’ve more than made up for it in quantity.
Reverting back to the “best rotation in the NL” claim, it can be explained easily: more innings from good pitchers are comparable (from a value perspective) to less innings from a great pitcher.
To illustrate, ask yourself this question, would you rather get 222.2 innings from Greinke and 139 innings from Frias, Mat Latos, Thomas, Juan Nicasio, Zach Lee, Brandon Beachy, Yimi Garcia, Wieland, Huff and Scott Baker or 180 innings each from Scott Kazmir and Kenta Maeda?
While Greinke allowed just 41 earned runs in his share of those innings, the rest combined to allow 89 earned runs in two-thirds of the innings — good for a 5.77 ERA.
Now, this isn’t to say that signing Greinke (in theory) wouldn’t have been a good idea. It’s more that there are other ways of reaching or, in this case, getting close, to the type of production that one elite pitcher can get you.
In signing two pitchers instead of one, it gives the Dodgers opening day starting rotation of something like Clayton Kershaw, Kazmir, Maeda, Brett Anderson and Alex Wood. As NEIFI Analytics summed it up:
#Dodgers 2-5 spots sum up to exact same RAR as #Dbacks and #Giants. Now consider the 1-spot.
— NEIFI Analytics (@NEIFIco) December 30, 2015
That tweet was just over one week prior to the news that Maeda had been signed to an eight-year contract was made official. Should a pitcher get injured, the Dodgers have Hyun-Jin Ryu and Brandon McCarthy eventually returning from injury.
Both conceivably could serve as the club’s No. 2 and 3 starter, respectively. Additionally, the Dodgers still have Bolsinger, and prospects Jharel Cotton, Jose De Leon, Frankie Montas and Julio Urias all waiting in the wings.
To frame this optimistically, the Dodgers have the best No. 1 starting pitcher in baseball, one of the best groups two through five, and arguably the best depth from the six spot and beyond.
So, no, Los Angeles doesn’t have the best 1-2 combination in baseball anymore, but for just north of $70 million less and with three more total contract years, it’s appears they’ll manage just fine.
