The Yankees-Dodgers weekend series may have only been a regular-season matchup in June, but it offered a chance to evaluate a potential World Series matchup between two of the sport's premier teams that happen to have a long history of sparring in October and are long overdue for a rematch.
The Yankees took two of three, which doesn't mean a whole lot at this point in the season. But that doesn't mean there weren't some key takeaways to be had. Here are a few things we learned, or re-learned from those three games in LA.
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Clayton Kershaw is still really good. After IL stints limited his time and ability to contribute the past two seasons, the long-time Dodgers ace and slam-dunk Hall of Famer showed in the series opener that he can still mow down playoff-quality lineups when healthy. He went seven innings and allowed two runs, scattering four hits and striking out nine. That gave him 89 strikeouts in 69.1 innings this season. A healthy Kershaw for the rest of the season could take the Dodgers far and make them even more of a postseason favorite than they already are.
Freddie Freeman is also really good. Yes, he went 1-for-14 in the Yankees series, but that "slump" dropped his OPS all the way down to ... .960. That's, uh, quite formidable. Freeman, fresh off winning NL Player of the Month for May, is having another MVP-caliber season and could give former teammate Ronald Acuña Jr. a run for the award this year if he keeps up this pace. Even with his cold series against the Yankees, Freeman is still slugging .500 over his past seven games. You'll take it.
Josh Donaldson can still hit (when he's healthy). Before the series, the 37-year-old Donaldson had been limited to just five games this season because of a hamstring injury. But in the first game of the series, he hit two monster homers halfway up the Dodger Stadium pavilion in left-center field and reminded everyone of what he was during the last decade, when he won an MVP with the Blue Jays and got MVP votes in four other seasons. But keeping him on the field has been an ongoing concern since 2017. He's had just one season since 2016 in which he's played more than 135 games (2019 with the Braves). But he's just two seasons removed from a 26-homer, 127 OPS+ season with the Twins, so the Yankees need him to buck his injury trend, keep his power stroke alive and produce a lot more of what they saw Friday night.
Aaron Judge may seem superhuman at times, but he's still a regular human susceptible to regular-human injuries. Judge injured his toe when he banged into the concrete base of the outfield wall while making a crazy catch Saturday night to rob J.D. Martinez of extra bases, crashing through the Yankees bullpen gate in the process. The instinct is to say Judge should be fine, but he missed Sunday's game as he nursed the banged-up foot and will reportedly have an MRI and/or X-rays on the toe early this week. It's a reminder that even during another MVP-caliber season, he and every other player is one play from potential disaster.
Mookie Betts is an elite lead-off hitter. OK, we didn't really learn this, but it was definitely confirmed again. Betts hit his 41st career lead-off homer in Friday's game, his first of two homers in the game, making him one of the few lead-off hitters truly in scoring position when they come to the plate. He has a career .902 OPS in the lead-off spot and an .892 OPS there this season. For context, the MLB average OPS for lead-off hitters this season is .754. Betts' 1.138 OPS as the first batter of the game this season is third-best in baseball and, well, pretty dang elite.
The Dodgers might have the most stacked lineup in the National League. I say "might" because they've been running neck-and-neck with the Braves for the top spot in many of the key offensive categories. They lead the league in runs scored and seem to flip-flip with the Braves for the lead in OPS, depending on the day. LA's .789 OPS as of Monday is just two points behind Atlanta's and is 34 points higher than the next-closest competition (Diamondbacks). They lead the NL in hits, homers, RBIs and walks and are a pretty complete offensive team. As long as everyone stays healthy — always a big if — LA could indeed pace the NL in offense in all the right places and be arguably the most dangerous lineup in the league.
The Yankees are still not among the elite offensive teams. Their .728 team OPS is 15th in MLB. They can still bop a ton of homers thanks mostly to Aaron Judge and Anthony Rizzo, but their .305 team on-base percentage ranks 25th. After Judge (.404) and Rizzo (.365), nobody in the lineup has an OBP higher than .333 and no other OPS is higher than .755. Not great. But timely long-balls and solid pitching — New York's 3.69 team ERA is fifth-best in baseball, and Carlos Rodon's eventual return could be a big boost — can still take a team far, and like everyone else in the AL East, the Yankees are plenty capable of a strong playoff run. But they'll certainly be working the phones as we approach the trade deadline.
Yankees-Dodgers still feels like a big deal. Even though these were just regular-season games in June, the series still had a certain gravitas. Perhaps it's just the mostly artificial "ooooh, ahhhhh" of a New York vs. Los Angeles matchup, but these teams have a history that's part of baseball lore, so anytime they meet it's gonna seem like a bigger deal than it might actually be. But it definitely helps that they're both playoff-caliber teams this season with players who are fun to watch. Plus, they've met 11 times in the World Series (but not since 1981) and it wouldn't be a shock if they met there again this season.
