The Consequences of a Dodgers World Series Win: Future of MLB

On the day many baseball fans have dreaded all season, the Los Angeles Dodgers are back-to-back World Series Champions. Now, with the MLB Collective Bargaining Agreement set to expire at the beginning of 2027, there is one more season to go. The rumbling of a nasty lockout and work strike is already swirling. At the heart of the rumors look no further than Exhibit A: the Dodgers’ World Series win. 

Are the Dodgers Bad for Baseball? 

Before the start of the 2025 season, the Dodgers were already a stacked super team coming off their second world series title this decade. A multiple MVP lineup with Shoei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman, and ace Yoshinobu Yamamoto. It felt like the rich only got richer this past offseason when LA signed former Cy Young winner Blake Snell. Ballooning the Dodgers team payroll to the league’s highest $350 million dollars. For reference to the league’s lowest payroll, the Miami Marlins sits at $67 million which is only 19% of what the entire Dodgers payroll was this year. The league average Seattle Mariners payroll at $164 million is barley 47% of the Dodgers. It begs the question of how bad the Dodgers are for baseball when they’ll spend way more on every single player. I’d argue it isn’t the Dodgers’ fault if they benefit from a broken system where no other team wants to spend money on players. That type of 80% gap in payrolls comes from teams/owners of “smaller market” teams unwilling to spend any money. Obviously not every team can spend $350 million dollars on a roster every year but there’s a difference between over kill then not even trying.  

Solution to Competitive Balance 

What will surely be the focal point at all MLB CBA meetings until or unless teams and players reach a new deal is the solution to this payroll gap. Many will argue that MLB needs to implement a salary cap to prevent the Dodgers from spending tons of money. I’ll argue the opposite that if teams what to compete more with the Dodgers for a better all-round baseball product, a salary floor needs to be implemented. If over half of the MLB team’s payroll doesn’t reach even half of what the Dodgers spend like mentioned before, there’s a huge probably with MLB owners simply not trying to put a competitive ball club out for their fans to see. If an owner is actually unable to spend financially on a team, then I’d board line say that should be grounds for MLB to force a sale of their team.  

MLB player would love this solution because it will give them more guaranteed money and Owners will hate it then want to issue a salary cap. Then if the two sides can find some sort of agreement baseball could be on strike for the 2027 season.  

Conclusion 

While I feel jealous of the Los Angeles Dodgers winning the World Series, it wasn’t my team. Are the Dodgers bad for baseball? No, I don’t believe so, and I don’t believe they should be penalized for actually trying to win, unlike other teams. This issue will surely become more heated in the offseason to come.