Just days after the Los Angeles Dodgers designated James Paxton for assignment, one MLB writer suggested they trade for another starting pitcher. Bleacher Report’s Tim Kelly writes that Jack Flaherty of the Detroit Tigers could help put Los Angeles over the top as it seeks its second World Series title this decade.
The Dodgers need healthy arms for their beaten-up starting rotation, Kelly wrote in a July 24 story identifying a trade deadline fit for each postseason contender.
“Maybe when October rolls around, the Dodgers will end up with too many good starting pitchers, due to a combination of stars getting healthy and continued success from Gavin Stone and Landon Knack,” Kelly wrote. “President of Baseball Operations Andrew Friedman can’t just hope for the best, though. He needs to add another pitcher capable of taking the ball during a pivotal playoff game in Philadelphia or Atlanta in the postseason.”
Flaherty is a veteran with postseason experience and success (3.60 career postseason ERA). At 28, he’s also amid a bounce-back year from a 2023 season that saw him take the ball just nine times. In 17 starts in 2024, he is 7-5 with a 3.13 ERA and 127 strikeouts in 100.2 innings pitched. He also has a WHIP of 0.964, lower than the number he posted in 2019 when he led the league in that category.
Jack Flaherty Makes Sense for the Dodgers to Win Now
Given the Dodgers’strong core, there’s not a ton of urgency for LA to capitalize on a championship window. But there is some.
Players don’t stay in their primes forever, and Clayton Kershaw, Mookie Betts, Shohei Ohtani and Freddie Freeman are all 30 or older. Flaherty is a free agent at the end of the year, so the Dodgers could use him as a quick rotation Band-Aid without being tied to a longer contract.
“As a rental, he makes sense for the Dodgers,” Kelly wrote. “A year from now, the Dodgers will likely have a much healthier pitching staff. Right now, though, they need a starter that helps them make the best of a peak year from Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman.”
The Dodgers hope they can trade Paxton before the July 30 deadline, The Athletic’s Fabian Ardaya wrote on July 22. He wrote that Dodgers general manager Brandon Gomes also acknowledged a tight trade market.
“There’s a scarcity of sellers,” Gomes said, according to Ardaya. “So it’s always going to be, what does it come down to? Probably day off and day before. I think any time we’re dealing at the deadline and on the buy side, it’s probably not something you’re going to feel great about.
State of the Dodgers’ Starting Rotation
Kershaw and Tyler Glasnow were both scheduled to come off the injured list during the week of July 22, with Glasnow pitching July 24 against the Giants. The roster logjam led to LA cutting Paxton, who was a reliable rotation presence while injuries took out everyone around him.
Dustin May is already out for the rest of the season and Ohtani won’t pitch again until next year. Walker Buehler is starting to gather steam in a comeback, but there’s still not timetable on him just yet, while Yoshinobu Yamamoto hopes to return late in the season.
It all combines to put the Dodgers in a spot where their playoff rotation could be anything from great to awful, and that’s why they need some stability.
