Dodgers Fans Have Seen This Play Out Before; Every Parallel to the 1988 World Series Club
The 2023 Los Angeles Dodgers may remind many Dodger fans of the special 1988 ballclub. After Saturday’s blowout loss, Dodger fans should remember the 1988 Dodgers lost Game 1 of the NLCS, and then, they won the series.
Yes, Clayton Kershaw let himself and his team down. However, this Dodger team won’t let anyone blame Kershaw for their troubles. Tommy Lasorda called the 1988 team his favorite, and Dave Roberts has said this team is his favorite.
The 1988 Dodgers lost both Fernando Valenzuela and Hall of Famer Don Sutton to injuries. Orel Hershiser, Tim Leary, and Tim Belcher, a rookie, took over for the injured starters. Of course, general manager Fred Clare traded for John Tudor, a veteran lefty starter, from the Saint Louis Cardinals, but he didn’t contribute much to the Dodgers.
Injuries and legal issues have decimated the 2023 Dodger starting rotation. If the Dodgers had Julio Urías, Dustin May, Walker Buehler, and Tony Gonsolin, Kershaw wouldn’t have started Game 1 of the NLDS. They are relying on rookies Bobby Miller, Emmet Sheehan, and Ryan Pepiot to succeed in the postseason.
The 1988 Dodgers had a veteran bench called the “Stunt Men” who helped them to win the World Series. The 2023 Dodgers have a veteran bench, and without them, they wouldn’t have made the postseason. Miguel Rojas played stellar defense at shortstop instead of the injured Gavin Lux. Jason Heyward and David Peralta provide veteran leadership.
The 1988 Dodgers had Kirk Gibson as their MVP, and this Dodger team has both Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman as their MVPs.
No pundit picked the 1988 Dodgers to win anything. Before this spring training, no pundits thought the Dodgers would win their division after the San Diego Padres made a splash this past offseason.
The Padres didn’t make the playoffs.
On Monday, the Dodgers need to continue to prove the “experts” wrong and continue the parallel to the ’88 squad.
Photo Credit: Kiyoshi Mio-USA TODAY Sports
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Winning this series is going to be extremely difficult. Arizona’s pitching is much better than ours. They have more team speed than we do. Outside of Bobby Miller our starting pitching is not great. And now we goto Arizona after tonight’s game. I pray LA finds a way to win, but to be honest I think we’re in trouble. Add to the fact that we scored 2 runs and only had 4 hits in the 1st game.
Obviously, us winning the division means nothing when we play poorly in the post season.
in 1988 we had Tommy Lasorda truly managing his club , for the past 8 yrs we’ve had Dave Roberts, , proof is in the pudding ,D.R doesn’t really manage his team ,a CPU does .
Yeah well then Roberts and the CPU are doing pretty good since they have won the division 10 of the last 11 years. And of course finishing with over a hundred wins consistently kinda says something is working I think.
100 wins this year with a shaky pitching staff ain’t bad!
Yeah well then Roberts and the CPU are doing pretty good since they have won the division 10 of the last 11 years. And of course finishing with over a hundred wins consistently kinda says something is working I think.
100 wins this year with a shaky pitching staff ain’t bad!
Yeah what’s with those back to back 100 win seasons? This is wishful thinking but imagine how good the team would be if Buehler, May, and Gonsolin were healthy. Not to mention Urias and Bauer. Those last two obviously tanked themselves so good riddance. As for Buehler and May both have had at least two surgeries with longer than normal recovery periods. It seems that their surgeon Dr. ElAttrache may not the surgical wizard that he is made out to be. He also did Ohtani’s elbow… twice. To be fair though I think their training regimen should also be looked at, although in this day and age they’d have that perfected.