What’s next for Los Angeles Dodgers after back-to-back World Series championships?

The 1998-2000 New York Yankees are no longer baseball’s last repeat champions. The Los Angeles Dodgers, thanks to a historic Game 7 comeback, beat the Toronto Blue Jays in Game 7 to win this year’s World Series despite looking shockingly feeble for much of the series. The on-paper rotation advantage didn’t materialize, the offense vanished for games at a time, and the bullpen and defense were too often unreliable. The Dodgers won despite looking like the inferior team for most of the seven games.

You needn’t try hard to see the Dodgers winning the NL West again next year, and finishing with one of the best records in baseball (if not the best) and making another run to the World Series. It’s a talented roster with a deep farm system, a smart front office, and an ownership group that is willing to go above and beyond financially. The Dodgers are as all-in as a team can get. Here’s what the Dodgers need to do this offseason to get stay on the top of the sport.

1. It’s time to start turning over the roster

Truth be told, the Dodgers started this process months ago. Longtime backup catcher Austin Barnes, the club’s longest-tenured position player, was released in May. Not even a week later, the Dodgers released super utility man Chris Taylor, a staple since 2016. Despite being popular teammates and important players in the franchise’s recent history, neither Barnes nor Taylor were productive players anymore, so the Dodgers moved on. They did what they felt was best for the team, feelings be damned.

The Dodgers must continue that process this offseason and some of it will happen organically with future Hall of Famer Clayton Kershaw having already announced his retirement. The Enrique Hernández era has run its course, especially since Postseason Kiké is no longer guaranteed to show up (he was largely quiet after the Wild Card Series). Now 35, Max Muncy remains a quality platoon bat, though he’s a liability at third base, and is at the age when offensive decline can come quick. The front office may have to take Blake Treinen away from manager Dave Roberts to get him to stop using him.

Los Angeles had the oldest group of position players in baseball this season and some of those guys (Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman, Teoscar Hernández, Shohei Ohtani, Will Smith) are locked in long-term. They aren’t locked into everyone, though, and there’s an obvious need to infuse some youth into the roster (Alex Freeland, Dalton Rushing, soon enough Josue De Paula, etc.). The Dodgers need to get more athletic and better defensively, and also incorporate into the lineup more players who are on the upswing and entering their prime rather than trying to stave off age-related decline.

Turning the page on a group of players who were important figures in a prosperous era of your team’s history is a difficult step, but it is a necessary one and it is an unavoidable one. Several of those players for the Dodgers have already aged out as regulars or are in the process of aging out as regulars. Saying goodbye to them is tough, especially for fans, but it is the front office’s job to put emotion aside and put the team in the best position moving forward. The Dodgers did that in May with Barnes and Taylor. That work must continue this winter.

2. They need another high-end bat

The Dodgers sputtering offensively throughout the World Series may have surprised many given the names in the lineup, but anyone who watched them regularly this season knew it didn’t come out of nowhere. The Dodgers had a knack for hard-to-believe ice cold streaks at the plate throughout the summer, and the fact of the matter is they had a mediocre offense over the final three months of the regular season. Here are their numbers from July 1 through the end of the regular season:

That is a long stretch — 77 team games, to be precise — of being a middle of the pack offense, and there were times they were downright putrid. What happened in the World Series wasn’t anything that hadn’t happened for a week at a time in July, August, or September. The Dodgers have to add youth into the roster. They also just need more bats. This is not a juggernaut (or even comfortably above average) offense right now despite its star power.

It is no surprise then that it has already been reported the Dodgers are expected to pursue Kyle Tucker, the offseason’s best free agent and one of the top hitters and all-around players in the sport. He would fit wonderfully in right field (with Teoscar sliding over to left) and in the middle of the lineup. The Dodgers were connected to Cleveland Guardians outfielder Steven Kwan at the trade deadline and could circle back. Tampa Bay Rays second baseman Brandon Lowe is surely a trade candidate as a Rays player with an eight-figure salary. He would be a one-year rental and lengthen the lineup nicely.

The offense was top heavy during the regular season and even moreso in October. The bottom four or five spots in the lineup were too often a black hole. There is room to add a bat in the outfield — Michael Conforto was one of the worst-hitting regulars in baseball this year, so much so that he was left off the postseason roster all four rounds the Dodgers played — and Tommy Edman’s versatility allows the Dodgers to seek an infielder too. The offense is not really as bad as it looked at times during the World Series, though there is clearly room for improvement here.

3. The bullpen needs to be reworked

The Dodgers won the World Series despite a really bad trade deadline. Conforto’s poor season was not a secret and yet the only outfielder they acquired was righty platoon guy Alex Call. The bullpen was a problem all season, and their only addition was righty Brock Stewart, who made four appearances before going down with a shoulder injury (not a shock given his injury history). The Dodgers bet on their improvement coming from within (Conforto, Treinen, Tanner Scott, Kirby Yates, et al being better) and they were losing that bet up until the final innings of Game 7.

The bullpen ranked 21st in ERA and 25th in win probability during the regular season, including 22nd in ERA and 30th in win probability after the trade deadline, which better reflects the players who were available to them in the postseason. There was much consternation about payroll when the Dodgers signed Scott and Yates, but both pitched poorly and never got their seasons on track. Yates was left off the postseason roster. Scott had to be removed from the postseason roster during the NLDS because of an infection, though he did not appear in a game before that. He was deemed untrustworthy and was pushed far down the depth chart.

Bullpens are tricky. Scott and Yates (and Treinen for that matter) were among the best relievers in the sport in 2024, then they were borderline unusable in 2025. Relievers can be like that. The Dodgers could run it back with largely the same relievers next season and get significantly better results, and not be the first team to do it. Some shuffling is required though. Scott will be back and it’s likely hard-throwing Edgardo Henriquez will get more responsibility. Maybe Game 3 hero Will Klein too. Righty Paul Gervase, who was part of the Ben Rortvedt/Hunter Feduccia trade with the Rays, has a chance to be an impact bullpen arm soon.

I don’t think reworking the bullpen is as important and turning over part of the aging position player core and adding a difference-making bat, but it is something that has to happen. The bullpen the Dodgers ran out there all season and into the postseason was too much of a liability. Their rotation was as healthy as it’s ever going to get, really, and we saw how quickly that can be undermined by a shaky relief crew. Bullpen improvement can come internally, at least to some extent, but it’s safe to assume the Dodgers will make outside additions as well. (I can’t say I expect them to give out another Scott-sized contract though.) 

We collectively make too much of the postseason and I’m including myself in that “we.” I certainly do it. They are the most important games of the season, but, ultimately, they are just a handful of games. The playoffs are good team vs. good team and a good team has to lose. As difficult as it can be, you have to be careful to not read too much into what happens in October. This is why general managers get the big bucks: to see through the noise and remain grounded.

In the case of the 2025 Dodgers, they won the World Series despite an offense prone to going silent and a shaky bullpen, so the postseason really just reinforced what we already knew. The Dodgers need an impact bat (maybe two) and to rework their relief crew. Continuing to move on from their aging stalwarts like they did with Barnes and Taylor is a must as well. That era of Dodgers baseball is ending and they have to move forward and begin assembling a new core around Betts, Freeman, Ohtani, and Yoshinobu Yamamoto. This group has more championships in it, though that doesn’t mean standing pat is the right move.