WASHINGTON — Tommy Edman was a wanted man for years.
Before acquiring him last July in a three-way trade involving the St. Louis Cardinals and Chicago White Sox – even though Edman was not ready to play following wrist surgery – the Dodgers had tried to pry him away from the Cardinals at various times over the previous three years, according to Dodgers general manager Brandon Gomes.
“It’s been awhile,” Gomes said. “Pound the Cardinals and they say, ‘No.’ So you keep asking and they say, ‘No.’ Then last year, we were talking about him very early on – like in April or May – just stayed on them. They were in a tough position because he’s a very good player for them and they’re trying to win. It got to a point last year where they felt they needed the pitching. That was our way to facilitate that deal with the White Sox.
“The objectives were clear. Then it was about adding pieces to pull it off. It was a long time in the making. But we’re very happy we were able to pull it off.”
What prompted the Dodgers’ persistence, Gomes said, was an appreciation for Edman’s versatility – positionally and as a switch-hitter – and “the little things that he’s able to do.”
Asked to list those little things, Gomes goes deep in describing “just a really high baseball IQ.”
“You watch him – the way he runs the bases, dirt-ball reads, the way he can read how a ball is going to drop and he’s able to take the extra base,” Gomes said. “The little things that don’t show up – where he’s able to pick a ball on a throw to second base that causes a force out instead of a safe call. Those things go unnoticed a lot of times and they are really crucial to winning obviously.
“His ability to do those things all over the diamond and play up the middle at an elite level, hit from both sides, have his stronger side be versus left-handed pitching in our lineup which is heavy left-handed. … Just hearing about him as a person, thinking about how he would fit in. I know that’s a lot of things. But just getting at the full picture of what he could add to our team was obviously incredibly attractive.
“Even the nights that he’s not getting three hits or hitting home runs, he’s helping you win in a number of different ways.”
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts has seen enough of that to make a sheepish admission.
“Not to discredit him,” Roberts said, “But he’s better than I thought he was.”
Edman is definitely better than he was before joining the Dodgers in one way – his power.
In five seasons with the Cardinals, Edman hit a total of 53 home runs, an average of one every 11.2 games or 45.8 plate appearances.
In 67 games with the Dodgers – including last fall’s postseason run featuring his National League Championship Series MVP – the 5-foot-9, 193-pound Edman has already hit 13 home runs including five in the first 14 games this season (tied for the NL lead through Wednesday). That’s one every 5.2 games or 21.3 plate appearances.
Part of the discussion before acquiring Edman, Gomes said, was hearing from hitting coaches Robert Van Scoyoc and Aaron Bates that, “Hey, there’s some things in the left-handed swing that we think we can get at.”
They have gotten at it, Edman said, with a lot of work.
“We’ve kind of just constantly been working on stuff,” he said. “Just being able to use the whole body rather than just the upper half. Trying to optimize the way I use the ground basically, being able to stay strong and allow myself to stay in good positions.
“I kind of had a general sense of what I did wrong. It was just tough to figure out how to fix it. I feel like I’ve had some good ideas and some good constant dialogue about when things start to look off how to get back to what it’s supposed to look like.”
Because he is naturally right-handed that swing needed less work. But during his left-handed swing, he had a tendency to “collapse on my back side.”
“I need to stay tall and stay strong,” he said. “If I collapse … I’m swinging with no legs because I’m not rotating at all. I’m basically just collapsing and drifting through the ball. So instead of that I need to stay strong and rotate my hips through.”
Edman said he never heard of the Dodgers’ previous attempts to trade for him until he joined the team last season. Hearing that, it allowed him to relax, knowing that the Dodgers didn’t just see him as a hired gun for their run at a championship.
“It meant a lot that they kind of identified me early and saw value in my game,” he said. “It was definitely encouraging once I got here to feel, ‘Okay, this is not a one-off thing. They enjoy my game and appreciate it.’ It kind of made it a little easier to play, knowing they had a certain view for me and the way they wanted me to contribute to the team.
“It was cool to hear those comments.”
That commitment was reinforced when the Dodgers signed the 29-year-old Edman to a five-year, $74 million contract extension last fall. It was something the Dodgers were “hopeful” could be worked out after they traded for him, Gomes said.
“Obviously you don’t know,” he said. “It was just, ‘Hey, it’s Southern California. This is a really good fit.’ So hopefully he loves it here and you can make it work. It was some piece (of the plan to acquire him). But obviously after his success and our success as a team, him loving it here, his family loving it here it was a perfect time to make something work.”
UP NEXT
Cubs (LHP Matt Boyd, 1-0, 0.00 ERA) at Dodgers (RHP Yoshinobu Yamamoto, 1-1, 1.69 ERA), Friday, 7:10 p.m., SportsNet LA, 570 AM