Many players have had their breakout seasons when they join the Los Angeles Dodgers, and Tommy Edman may be the next joining that list.
The Dodgers acquired Edman at the trade deadline as part of a three-team deal with the Chicago White Sox and St. Louis Cardinals. Edman has been a player the Dodgers have long coveted and pushed their way into the trade negotiations.
He gave them another high-floor player with versatility at two positions of need: center field and the middle infield.
While Edman has long been a solid player, he’s always been known for his defense, baserunning and bat-to-ball skills, rather than showing any power.
However, with the Dodgers, Edman has been an extra-base hit machine, and that has surprised manager Dave Roberts, via Bill Plunkett of the Southern California News Group:
“Really surprised with the power,” Roberts said and he wasn’t alone.
Edman already has six home runs in just 27 games with the Dodgers, which has earned him the nickname Tommy Tanks from teammates.
In addition, he’s added four doubles and a triple, giving him 11 extra-base hits in 104 at-bats. His slugging percentage of .510 is more than .100 points higher than any season of his career since 2019, when he last posted a .500 slug.
The power totals have even surprised Edman himself, who missed most of the year with a wrist and ankle injury:
“Honestly, kind of a little surprised,” Edman himself admitted. “The wrist didn’t feel good for a while (after surgery last fall). I was kind of expecting to be back for spring training and it kept lingering for a few months and finally started to feel good in June, July and then I sprained the ankle. I think actually spraining the ankle allowed my wrist to have some more time to recover and maybe that helped with being back to full strength once I started to play again.”
Edman’s home run rate of .222 per game this season places him on a pace of 36 over a full season. He owns a career-high of 13, which he set in each of 2022 and 2023.
Edman started out slowly in the power department when he first returned off the injured list, but all six of his homers have come in the previous eight games.
He started the stretch out with two on Sept. 10 and followed with two more on Sept. 11.
Edman also homered from each side of the plate in the same game, marking the first time in his career he’s done that and becoming the first Dodgers hitter to accomplish it since Yasmani Grandal in 2019.
Whether Edman can keep up the power numbers remains to be seen, and it’s more than likely he’ll slow down, but even finishing with a 20-home run pace instead of 30+ would be a significant improvement for him, and something the Dodgers would surely love.
Edman is under contract for one more season after 2024, and it would not be surprising to see the Dodgers make an effort to extend him at some point.
Tommy Edman ‘locked into a good routine’
Edman found success this season quickly after coming off the IL, and he credits that to the work he’s putting in to prepare.
“I feel like I’ve kind of gotten locked into a good routine in the cage, working on mechanics and having consistent movements in my swing and the results are paying off,” Edman noted.
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