DAVE ROBERTS HAS SHUT UP HIS CRITICS … AND EARNS ONLY $8.1 MILLION ANNUALLY?
Though he has won two World Series and could win a few more, Roberts still earns less money than Craig Counsell in Chicago when he’s a riveting conversationalist about the Dodgers, baseball and life
Have we ever seen a baseball manager so eloquent? Far from those who spit on umps, submit wrong lineup cards and bet on the games, Dave Roberts is a spokesperson for the Dodgers, for Los Angeles, for Chavez Ravine, for America, for Japan, and for whatever else is in the air. He is resplendent about Jackie Robinson. He is precious about Shohei Ohtani and the interpreter who stole $17 million from him.
He knows why Blue is gorgeous and why Bobbleheads work. “It was an out-of-body experience, me dancing with Ice Cube,” he said, referring to the new giveaway.
He could speak for the President, not that he would try. He would explain the wildfires better than the mayor or governor. It’s hard to believe, given the financial insanity around his ballclub, that he hasn’t dealt with internal controversy impeding the daily pressure to win championships. For some of us who asked if he’d blow the most postseasons, Roberts has won two World Series and might win four before we blink.
And yet his new deal — $32.4 million for four years — is $667.6 million less than what Ohtani makes on a team that throws hundreds of millions at several players. It’s another example of why managers are the most abused species in sports. Revenues keep rising, to a record $12.1 billion last year, yet the men who run dugouts must scream to remain above the minimum salary for players. Not until Craig Counsell moved from Milwaukee to Chicago, for $40 million over five years, did anyone think about actually paying a manager. Those who run organizations tend to be Ivy League smart asses lacking respect for the skippers, if you recall when Theo Epstein ran off Joe Maddon with the Cubs.
No one is certain the Dodgers respect Roberts, either. Without a choice, the bosses approved the upgrade this week. He owns the highest-ever win percentage, at 851-507, and has won four National League pennants in nine straight years of making the playoffs. Yet he hasn’t reached the money plateau of Counsell, who never has been a World Series manager. A four-year contract isn’t entirely concrete, is it?
He’s excited to manage a team that shouldn’t lose. And if the Dodgers fail, Roberts will be blamed again. It’s the damndest duty, knowing he wins only if they win it all. If they finish second, he’s on the gunner’s line because of pitching inconsistencies. Now that Andrew Friedman has secured an all-time starting rotation — once Ohtani is healthy, he’ll join Blake Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Roki Sasaki and Tyler Glasnow — and has loaded up the bullpen, is there any chance Roberts will mess up in October?
“I am excited and grateful to continue a great journey with the Los Angeles Dodgers, the best organization in sports,” he said. “Building my relationships with the players and the fans has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life — and it’s a privilege I do not take lightly.”
Only days earlier, he suggested value was an issue. “You guys all know this is where I want to be. I just think it all comes down to value. And I think whatever anyone does, they want their value,” he said. “I do my job because I love baseball, I love the Dodgers and I love the players. But I do feel the body of work is pretty dang good.”
Dang good is exceptional.
He is thrilled to have won a championship without a hiccup. In 2020, the Dodgers won amid COVID-19 in a short season. “I’m sure there’s no asterisk on this one,” he said. “This is something I really wanted, I wanted this one.” The executives watched closely as last year’s team encountered injuries. Roberts was the cool breeze on hot days. “I think there were times, with some of the injuries we had, where it was a little bit deflating,” Friedman said. “And I think Doc did a great job of getting in front of that and pumping enthusiasm and optimism into the group.”
That’s what he does best. Every day, he reports with a smile in the most demanding job in baseball — if not all sports. “He manages this club based on the guys in this room,” third baseman Max Muncy said. “He doesn’t do it off a spreadsheet. He doesn’t do it off what someone tells him. He walks around and he has conversations with everybody.”
He is fortunate to work for a billionaire-folly owner in a town where four million people will fill the stadium. With those perks, what can Roberts do but shrug about a 2-1 deficit to San Diego in the NL Division Series? “I do think that if we didn’t win that game it would have become very noisy,’’ he said. “A team that was obviously super-talented to lose three years in a row in the first round — albeit it takes all of us to win and lose — but I do think that calls for my job would have been heightened.
“It’s interesting where you don’t win a series and you can feel calls for your job. But you win the World Series and now people are saying you’re going to Cooperstown.”
Will the Hall of Fame happen? We’ll talk in November. The celebration dance with Ice Cube continues to bop throughout town, and if you’d like him to discuss further, he will. Dave Roberts is an even better conversationalist when he is locked in.
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Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.