GLENDALE, Ariz. — Andrew Friedman’s phone got very busy in the aftermath of Gavin Lux’s season-ending knee injury earlier this week.
“A lot of ambulance chasers came out after the injury,” Friedman joked. “There were teams, agents. There was a lot.”
The wave of incoming calls has given way to outgoing inquiries as the Dodgers’ front office assesses potential upgrades to a roster that is now thinner with the subtraction of Lux.
“Depth is always something that we talk about. It was a big driver for us to go out and get Miguel Rojas and we feel like between him and CT that we’re in a good spot,” Friedman said. “Obviously, there’s now a layer of depth that is removed for 2023 so we’re definitely susceptible if we have another injury.
“So we’ve decided that we just won’t have another injury for the rest of the year.”
Friedman’s gallows humor aside, he acknowledged that “continuing to add depth is something we have to be mindful of.” That depth does not necessarily have to be a shortstop or even an infielder, Friedman said, because of the versatility of the Dodgers’ position players.
“We feel that the guys that we have here are a really good group,” he said. “So for us, if we are going to add from the outside it’s going to be something that fits us differently or is a more impactful player in our mind.”
That player, Friedman admitted, is not likely to be among the remaining free agents – a thin group topped by Jurickson Profar and Jose Iglesias. Making a trade to upgrade the roster, even if that just means adding depth, won’t be easy.
“It’s difficult. It’s not the most natural time to make a trade,” Friedman said. “So we’ll spend more time figuring out what’s possible. We’re not sure at this point and we’re trying to wrap our arms around the various profiles of a player and how it would fit. There’s been a domino effect of how guys are now going to spend time and what positions they are…
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