Blake Snell becomes the first free agent in my top 10 to sign this winter, inking a five-year, $182 million deal with the Dodgers that gives the defending World champs a potential ace — as long as he can stay on the mound.
Snell entered free agency this winter after an abbreviated season with the Giants of 20 starts and 104 innings — the fifth time in his seven full seasons that he failed to qualify for the ERA title — but he’s also coming off the best half-season of his career. After a late start to his 2024 season and two IL stints for adductor and groin injuries, he returned on July 9 and was the best pitcher in the National League from that point onward, throwing 80 innings with 114 strikeouts and 30 walks allowed. He was unscored upon in seven of his 14 starts, and struck out 38 percent of batters he faced in that span. There was some BABIP luck, to be sure, as no one is sustaining a .203 BABIP for very long, but his FIP in that smaller sample was only 1.77.
Snell has a tremendous arsenal, with a 95-97 mph fastball with good carry, a plus-plus curveball that has big horizontal break, and a changeup that doesn’t have a lot of movement but that he sells really well so hitters don’t pick it up. Statcast ranked the curveball as the fifth-most valuable in the majors last year at +10 runs above average, even though Snell threw fewer curveballs than any of the four guys ahead of him on that list. The Dodgers might be flummoxed by a pitcher who doesn’t come into the system needing whatever sort of dark magic pitch design they’re using over there.
That’s not to say Snell is without risk, as he’s one of the least durable starters of his caliber in baseball. He’s reached 130 innings just twice in his career, topping out at 180 2/3, although both times he pitched a full season he won the Cy Young Award. He’s only made 25 starts three times.
The adductor strain he suffered in 2024 was his third such injury in four years, and he’s had numerous other injuries as well, although he’s never had any arm injuries that cost him a full year like a torn UCL. Snell getting a five-year contract one season after he had to take a one-plus-an-option deal is a huge win for him and his agent, Scott Boras, but that’s a huge investment in a starter who probably only makes 100 or so starts over the course of the contract.
The Dodgers have exactly nobody on their roster who is a strong bet to make 30 starts in 2025, so while adding Snell helps — he’d help every team in baseball — they still have too much variance in their rotation’s likely bulk production. This past season, Yoshinobu Yamamato made 18 starts around a shoulder injury. Tyler Glasnow started a career-best 22 games, but went down with an elbow sprain, and he’s already had Tommy John surgery once. Bobby Miller made 13 starts, and we won’t speak more of them. Landon Knack made 12. Their leader in innings pitched and starts in 2024 was actually Gavin Stone, who is out for 2025 after shoulder surgery.
Yes, Shohei Ohtani should return to the mound this year, and I certainly won’t underestimate him, but I don’t think anyone should count on him making 25 starts in his first year back from his second Tommy John surgery. Even writing these last two paragraphs makes me question whether the Dodgers won the World Series this year. It seems improbable.
Snell is the de facto ace for the Dodgers, at least for now, with Yamamoto, Glasnow, Ohtani, and Knack or Miller making up the rest of the rotation on paper. Tony Gonsolin and Dustin May could also factor in as they complete their injury rehabs. That said, they’re clearly going to go get someone else. Maybe that’s Roki Sasaki, maybe it’s bringing back Walker Buehler — whose medicals they would know better than anyone — but I can’t believe this will be the only move the Dodgers make for their rotation.
I had Snell as the fourth-best starter on the free agent market, behind Corbin Burnes, Max Fried, and Sasaki. The first two should be giddy if this is the going rate for an upper-echelon starter; neither has Snell’s two Cy Young Awards, but Burnes has one, both are younger than Snell by a year, and both have been more durable.
Sasaki’s market is constrained by the silly rule that considers him an “amateur” because he’s younger than 25, even though he’s pitched for several years in the most major league there is beyond the AL and NL, so this signing probably doesn’t affect him at all.
There are still far more teams out there that could use a top-shelf starter like the ones I mentioned or Jack Flaherty than there are such guys in this market, so teams like the Orioles, Mets, Red Sox, and Tigers, to name just a few, are either going to have to spend big to get the No. 1/No. 2 starters they need or miss out on the limited supply.
(Top photo: Godofredo A. Vásquez / Associated Press)
