From Dodger Insider magazine: Dave Roberts — Leader of the ’ship
Dave Roberts has elevated his place among managerial greats
Editor’s note: This story is taken from the pages of Dodger Insider magazine.
Dave Roberts sat in a chair in front of a table covered with blue cloth. He was wearing a Dodger jersey and cap for the first time in 11 years. It was full circle for the Dodger outfielder at the press conference introducing him as Dodger manager.
After he shared his gratitude and talked about history, he talked directly about the weight of his new job.
“People have asked me in passing about this opportunity,” he said on Dec. 1, 2015. “I look at it as a responsibility.”
He knew.
The responsibilities have included many things over nearly the last decade — on the field and off. Winning World Series being paramount.
The 2017 and 2018 seasons were close. He and the Dodgers achieved it in 2020, but a global pandemic put a kind of distance between that championship and the fanbase.
Despite winning 106, 111 and 100 games in the next three regular seasons, playoff exits amid enormous expectations raised the urgency and temperature surrounding the Dodger skipper. It created a narrative.
“I don’t hear it,” Roberts now reflects. “I feel it.”
He felt it after falling behind two games to one to the Padres in the 2024 National League Division Series. Roberts will often use the phrase “pulling levers.” Every single one he pulled from then on seemed to be the right one.
The next 20 days that encompassed the rest of the 2024 postseason were a microcosm of who Roberts had always been as Dodger manager.
A baserunning dynamo and intelligent hitter as a Major League player, Roberts as a manager is a run-prevention devotee and master bullpen operator. An underdog player who pushed his body to the limits every day to make and stay in the big leagues, Roberts now is a general who knows when to yield for the sake of long-term planning and health — despite the moans from external forces.
For 20 days, all of those qualities were in the spotlight.
And on the 20th day, Roberts guided his Dodgers to a World Series championship.
There was satisfaction for the manager with the greatest winning percentage in National League/American League regular season history.
“It was a big one,” Roberts admits of winning the 2024 World Series. “I think that for me to win it with a normalcy, to have the parade, to celebrate with our players, the organization, the fans, I think there was some validation there. And I hate even admitting that, but there was some validation.”
Hating to admit it gives credit to the narrative.
Others won’t give it any credit.
“If you talk to not just me, everybody, we trust him,” says Dodger first baseman Freddie Freeman. “And I think that’s the key to this whole thing, is trust in Doc. He trusts us, and we trust him. We won last year because of that and it’s because of Doc.
“I know we have great players here, believe me. And he’ll be the first one to say we won because of great players. Game 5 is the masterpiece of managing a baseball game. And who did it? It was Dave Roberts.”
World Series Game 5 is a shining example of Roberts’ impact, but there were many events along the way that led to that point.
There were numerous points during the 2024 postseason where Roberts made bullpen moves that preserved arms for future games. And in bullpen games — like the critical Game 4 National League Division Series win against the Padres and the NL Championship clincher in Game 6 against the Mets — Roberts’ feel was on point with bullpen usage.
World Series Game 5 became fight or flight after the Yankees knocked Dodger starting pitcher Jack Flaherty out of the game in the second inning. With Roberts leading and showing no panic, he held the needle and stitched together a game using seven relief pitchers.
“I don’t think people understand how hard that was,” Freeman says. “Blake Treinen gave everything he could to be out there. You had Michael Kopech pitching in the fourth inning, who was closing games. There were so many things and so much trust that came out of those gates in Doc and (bullpen coach) Josh Bard and (pitching coaches) Mark Prior and Connor McGuiness to go out there and perform and know it was like, ‘OK, I’m putting you in because I know you can do this.’
“I don’t know if we can stress it enough how hard that was what he navigated,” Freeman continues. “And then to have the gutsy move to put Walker Buehler into that game when he was supposed to start (Game 6). If we lose, we don’t have a starter for Game 6. I don’t know if people understand the magnitude of those moves that he was making. And he pushed every button — the right ones.”
Trust starts long before the most critical games of the season. Roberts builds it — with veterans and rookies. It begins at the arrival.
One of the first stops for a player who has just been promoted from the Minor Leagues, traded to the club or signed as a free agent is Roberts’ office.
Pitcher Landon Knack arrived at Dodger Stadium in mid-April last season in advance of his Major League debut — a start on April 17, 2024, against the Washington Nationals. He went to Roberts’ office just outside the Dodger clubhouse where the Dodger manager put him at ease — first welcoming him to the Major Leagues, then talking about family and then giving him some encouragement.
Knack went on to make 12 starts for the Dodgers in the 2024 regular season and appeared in 15 games. He made a strong enough impression to be included on the Dodgers’ postseason rosters for the NLDS, NLCS and World Series.
But things went awry in the second inning of NLCS Game 2 against the Mets at Dodger Stadium. Knack, tasked with taking the bulk of the innings in a prescribed bullpen game, allowed five runs in the second. Mets third baseman Mark Vientos hit a crowd-silencing grand slam in the inning. The rookie didn’t pitch again in the NLCS.
“(Roberts) came and found me right before (World Series) Game 1 started,” Knack recalls. “He was basically, ‘Hey, I know that’s not what you wanted, but you’re going to be big in this one. So just take care of what you do and just go out there. Your stuff’s going to play.’”
The Dodgers were in a hole early in World Series Game 4, down 5–2 in the third inning. They turned to Knack to, at the very least, eat up some innings. Knack excelled, allowing one run over four innings. His four innings ended up being critical, allowing the Dodgers to empty the bullpen in their World Series-clinching Game 5 victory.
“He’s so good at being able to read the room, being able to understand what he needs to do for different guys and how to motivate everybody,” Knack says of Roberts. “And so 100% being able to have that confidence from him to be able to kind of push me and have my back there too, it’s just such a good feeling.”
Veteran infielder Miguel Rojas shares a similar story about Roberts’ communicating through a difficult situation during the postseason.
Rojas battled through an adductor muscle injury and sports hernia in the latter part of the 2024 regular season. He missed the final four games but was back for the NLDS.
The Dodgers, though, felt the best move for the NLCS was a roster minus Rojas. The competitor came out, Rojas says, when he was informed by Roberts and Executive Vice President and General Manager Brandon Gomes.
“It was a very good argument that I tried,” Rojas recalls. “I almost got out of the office crying that day.”
Rojas says he later realized it was the best move for the team to have a healthier player on the roster, which also gave him time to heal, in case there was a World Series.
Rojas stood on the third base line before Game 1 of the NLCS during the series’ player introductions. Roberts approached him.
“He gave me a big hug, and he said, ‘We’re going to win this one together,’” Rojas says. “So it was kind of like he’s telling me the future, that I will be there with him. So that kind of made me respect him even more than I already respected him. So it was a pretty special moment and made me feel like someone had my back, even though I wasn’t on the roster.”
Rojas made the World Series roster and was in the starting lineup in Game 2.
Four days later, Rojas, Knack, Freeman and the rest of the Dodgers stood on a stage at Yankee Stadium with their manager.
“As we continued to get knocked down with injury after injury, Dave (was) able to put the pieces together — whether it be lineup or pitching staff — along with (our coaching staff), and continue to just be, ‘No matter who we lose, we are good enough to win this thing,’” Gomes says. “Continuing to instill the confidence in our group and understanding the strengths and weaknesses of each guy to piece it together, I think that’s as impressive of a job as we’ve seen.”
Roberts has skippered the Dodger ship to nine postseason appearances in nine seasons, four NL pennants and two World Series championships.
Nine seasons in, and after the second World Series championship, a delivery truck arrived with a metaphorical bouquet.
“We love that man,” Freeman says. “We trust him. I don’t know if there is a better person to handle what comes with everything that comes with being the Los Angeles Dodgers manager. … It’s hard not to give this guy his flowers.”
From Dodger Insider magazine: Dave Roberts — Leader of the ’ship was originally published in Dodger Insider on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.