The world according to Jim:
• Dodgers TV analyst Eric Karros had this gripe during a recent game, in reference to a graphic with Dave Roberts’ accomplishments as Dodgers manager – a growing list that includes three World Series titles, nine division titles and 10 postseason berths in his 10 seasons, the best career winning percentage of any active manager by a lot and residence in the 1,000-win club.
And then there was this nugget: One lone Manager of the Year award, won during his first season as manager in 2016 when the Dodgers went 91-71 – and that was one game worse than Don Mattingly’s record the previous season, before Mattingly and baseball operations boss Andrew Friedman anounced the “mutual decision” to go their separate ways.
How, Karros asked, could a manager so accomplished as Roberts only win that award once in a decade? …
• As a voter for that award periodically, including twice in the past three seasons, I can explain, sort of. The 30 members of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America who vote for the National League and American League Managers of the Year, two from each city, tend to reward the skipper whose team overachieves or wasn’t expected to be where it ended up. …
• This is why Pat Murphy won it the last two seasons with the small market Milwaukee Brewers. Full disclosure: I had a vote in 2025 and my top three were Murphy, Rob Thomson of the Philadelphia Phillies and Terry Francona of the Cincinnati Reds. Why not Roberts? Maybe I paid too much attention to that July and August slump that ultimately forced the Dodgers into the wild card round as the No. 3 division winner. The bar here, you see, is high.
There were times during the postseason, lots of them, when I was rethinking my vote. But the ballots were due at the end of the regular season, so there was no do-over. …
• Roberts has come close to winning a second time, finishing second to Arizona’s Torey Lovullo in 2017 and the New York Mets’ Buck Showalter in 2022. When Roberts won it in 2016 he was the third first-year manager in three years to win it. The NL winners since then: Lovullo, Brian Snitker, Mike Shildt, Mattingly with Miami, Gabe Kapler, Showalter, Skip Schumaker, also with Miami, and Murphy back to back. …
• Does this mean that if the Marlins show any sort of pulse at all, their guy’s going to get votes? That would bode well for former Dodgers coach Clayton McCullough, who has the Fightin’ Fish over .500 and, as of Thursday, in a wild card spot after being in last place at the end of May. …
• Today’s quiz: How did Roberts do in his first game as a manager? Answer below. …
• And yes, I can hear the refrain from 29 other fan bases: “Of course he’s a successful manager. His organization buys him all the best players.”
Sure, his teams have lots of talent. But a lot of other talented teams have faltered or come apart. The secret to Roberts’ success and his staying power: He has fostered a clubhouse culture that has enabled those players to flourish and to recognize that sometimes you’ve got to sacrifice for the benefit of the team. And the players buy in. That isn’t a given. …
• Fans generally judge a manager on what they see: Lineups, strategy, bullpen use, etc. The art of managing people, and getting the best out of them, is more nuanced.
“I think it’s individual based,” Roberts said during the 2024 World Series. “… I just try to be sensitive to kind of where they’re at in the moment personally, trying to get the best out of them. I communicate with each guy differently, so there’s a lot of conversations. But I think the ultimate goal has got to be about our ball club.
“I just try to make it about them, not about me, and about the Dodgers.” …
• Incidentally, we’ve come up with a script for pitching coach Mark Prior to deliver when he visits the mound to talk to a struggling Dodgers pitcher:
“Babe Ruth’s dead, Barry Bonds is retired, and Shohei Ohtani plays for your team. So why are you having so much trouble throwing strikes?” …
• Quiz answer: Roberts was the acting skipper of the Padres on June 15, 2015, after Bud Black’s firing. It didn’t go well: A 9-1 loss to Oakland at Petco Park that spiraled out of control with a five-run eighth inning, including a grand slam by Stephen Vogt, who is now Cleveland’s manager (and the AL Manager of the Year in 2024 and ’25).
The oddities: One of the A’s players was a guy named Max Muncy – the original, the one Roberts now manages with the Dodgers – who played first base and went 1 for 5 with a double and two strikeouts. And Roberts went back to his bench coach duties the next night when Pat Murphy took over as interim manager. …
• Story pitch of the week: According to a survey from the Action Network, Angels fans are “third in MLB for heavy in-game drinking rate,” with 15.8% of their fans consuming five or more drinks – I presume they mean alcoholic – during a game.
First reaction: If this is accurate, is the Anaheim PD keeping track of this? And the second … nah, saying the Angels drive their fans to drink is way too easy. …
• One talking point coming out of Fox’s World Cup coverage: Alexi Lalas is pushing a lot of buttons, and in the face of all of the criticism the network seems happy with what they’re getting. Fox CEO Eric Shanks, in an interview with Puck News’ John Ourand, called Lalas a “cornerstone,” adding: “He’s the straw that stirs the drink, and he’ll be the cornerstone for many years to come.”
Reggie Jackson would like a word, by the way. …
• Zlatan Ibrahimović – whom Galaxy fans likely remember for his outsized personality – has also made an impact, though Shanks said they had to recruit him hard because he originally didn’t want to do TV.
“He’s been a tremendous teammate and brings the world’s most unique personality into the studio,” Shanks told Ourand. “There is no ‘on air’ and ‘off air,’ there is just Zlatan. Hopefully America has fallen in love with somebody whom a lot of them had no idea existed.” …
• So, was the Lakers’ full day of restocking their roster on Wednesday a major disappointment? Snap judgments are difficult when the transactions, league-wide, keep coming at you like there’s an open firehose, but it’s hard to shake the feeling that Rob Pelinka underachieved massively with the draft capital and $50 million in cap space he had at his disposal. It’s liable to cost him his job if these guys don’t overperform. …
• But this is a certainty: We will need every bit of the 3½ months between now and opening night to memorize the spelling of Sandro Mamukelashvili without having to look it up.
Will it be worth the effort?
jalexander@scng.com