The Dodgers have one of the best teams in baseball, but getting over the hump this year may require some heavy maneuvering at the Major League Baseball trade deadline.
This year the deadline is set for July 30, which gives Los Angeles some time to figure out exactly how dramatic their tweaks need to be.
Pitching will be on every contending team's docket during trade season, although given how good LA's rotation has been through the first couple months it doesn't seem likely that they'll need to go make a big swing for a top-end starter. Tyler Glasnow, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Gavin Stone have been excellent. Walker Buehler is still getting his bearings after returning from injury, but there have been enough flashes to have optimism about him heading into the fall. In a playoff series that quartet should be enough, and James Paxton has been fine as a fifth starter.
Relief pitching is another area every contending team can use help in, and it's likely the area LA would attack if they made a significant move. Evan Phillips' return shores up the back end of their bullpen alongside Blake Treinen and Daniel Hudson. Adding another dominant arm to the bullpen would allow the Dodgers to make playoff games extremely short behind their already strong rotation. It would also inflate their margin of error both on the mound and at the plate.
The batter's box is where LA is most likely to make a change. Finding another consistent bat in the outfield would help their struggling lineup a ton. Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman and Shohei Ohtani have all been good. Will Smith is one of the best catchers in baseball, and Max Muncy's return from the IL should help the infield's overall production.
However, the consistency at the plate from the outfield hasn't been good enough. There are a couple options with either trading for an outfielder or adding a shortstop and moving Betts back to the outfield. Either way they simply have to be better at the plate than they've been since the middle of May. There may be an internal solution, but getting active at the July 30 deadline would be the most direct course toward helping increase the Dodgers' chances of hoisting another World Series trophy.
