Dodgers eyeing a historic three-peat after back-to-back World Series wins

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The party’s over and now the Los Angeles Dodgers are turning to 2026 with designs on winning a third consecutive World Series.

“What’s better than two?” manager Dave Roberts asked at the team’s rally at Dodger Stadium on Monday. “Three — three-peat! Three-peat!”

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Roberts said he’d gotten permission from his friend Pat Riley to use the phrase that the Miami Heat president trademarked in 1988.

Soft-spoken and rarely seen team owner Mark Walter vowed to be “back next year” for another championship celebration.

First baseman Freddie Freeman told a sold out crowd, “Job in 2024, done. Job in 2025, done. Job in 2026 starts now.”

With three titles in the last six years, the Dodgers next will attempt to equal the New York Yankees, who were the last team to win three consecutive championships from 1998-2000.

“I’m already thinking about the third time we’re going to do this,” two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani said.

It certainly seems possible. The team brings back all of its biggest names, alternately striking fear and grudging admiration in the hearts of baseball’s other 29 teams.

Andrew Friedman, president of baseball operations, has already referred to this time as “the golden era of Dodgers baseball.”

Throw in five National League pennants in the last nine years and 12 NL West titles in 13 years and, well, the word dynasty is becoming synonymous with the Dodgers.

“I think definitionally it’s a dynasty,” Friedman said. “For me, it’s still evolving and growing and we want to add to it and we want to continue it and do everything we can to put it at a level where people after us have a hard time reaching.”

The Dodgers won the title last year mixing and matching their relievers. This season, the starting rotation survived a string of injuries to return in time to pitch the team to its ninth World Series title in franchise history.

“It’s really an exceptional, exceptional staff,” Phillies president Dave Dombrowski said after his team lost to the Dodgers in the NL Division Series. “If you’re going to beat them, you’re really going to have to do everything right.”

Ohtani was brought along slowly in his return to the mound this season after rehabbing from elbow surgery in December 2023. He produced another NL MVP-worthy season at the plate and with no restrictions on the mound next year could do things few think possible.

The Dodgers have seven free agents, although three-time Cy Young Award winner Clayton Kershaw officially retired when the World Series ended.

The two most prominent are Kiké Hernández and Game 7 hero Miguel Rojas, whose home run tied the game in the ninth inning against the Toronto Blue Jays.

The Dodgers figure to make a push to bring Hernández back. He was a regular starter in the postseason where some of his biggest exploits have occurred. Rojas has been valuable off the bench the last three years and his ability to play all three infield positions helped the team withstand injuries to Max Muncy and Tommy Edman. But he’s 36 and the Dodgers may want to acquire youth off the bench.

The other four free agents are Michael Conforto and pitchers Andrew Heaney, Michael Kopech and Kirby Yates. None of them made any of the team’s postseason rosters.

Conforto hit .199 and never lived up to his $17 million, one-year deal despite spending most of the season as the starting left fielder. Yates, who came in on a $13 million, one-year deal, had a 5.23 ERA in 41 1/3 innings pitched. He had three stints on the injured list and at 38 has hinted he might retire.

Kopech was part of a dominant bullpen that helped carry the Dodgers to their 2024 championship. But he began this season on the injured list and later had knee surgery. He was relegated to pitching in 14 games before his season ended in September with another IL stint.

Heaney signed a minor league deal with the Dodgers in August and got called up on the next-to-last day of the regular season. He made one appearance, but more memorably he was the 62nd player used by the team, setting a franchise record.

Kershaw has been offered a job with the team by Friedman, so he may be a continuing presence around Chavez Ravine.

“I know they’re going to get one more next year,” he told the fans, “and I’m going to watch just like all of you.”