{"id":328675,"date":"2025-12-05T04:33:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T04:33:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/328675\/"},"modified":"2025-12-05T04:33:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-05T04:33:12","slug":"dodgers-have-shown-interest-in-robert-suarez","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/328675\/","title":{"rendered":"Dodgers Have Shown Interest In Robert Suarez"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Dodgers are among the teams with interest in free agent closer\u00a0Robert Suarez<\/a>, report Fabian Ardaya and Katie Woo of The Athletic<\/a>. L.A.\u2019s interest in adding a high-leverage reliever is well-known, but Ardaya and Woo write that they\u2019d prefer that to be on a shorter-term commitment.<\/p>\n

Suarez, who turns 35 in Spring Training, might be the ideal candidate. The length of his deal will be capped by his age and he\u2019s among the best relievers available. Suarez has posted a sub-3.00 ERA in three of his four seasons since signing with the Padres during the 2021-22 offseason. That includes a 2.97 mark across a career-high 69 2\/3 innings this past season. He led the National League with 40 saves in 45 tries and has an MLB-high 76 saves over the last two years.<\/p>\n

One of the hardest throwers in the sport, Suarez averaged 98.6 MPH on his fastball. He has dominated hitters from both sides of the plate over the course of his career, as his changeup gives him a weapon against left-handed batters. He punched out 27.9% of opponents against a career-low 5.9% walk rate this year. Suarez doesn\u2019t get quite as many whiffs as one might expect based on the velocity \u2014 he essentially hasn\u2019t thrown a breaking ball in the last two years \u2014 but it\u2019s difficult to argue the track record.<\/p>\n

MLBTR predicted<\/a> Suarez to receive a three-year, $48MM contract. A three-year deal should be the ceiling, and it\u2019s not out of the question that he\u2019s limited to two years at a premium annual value. As Front Office subscribers can find on MLBTR\u2019s Contract Tracker<\/a>, there have only been two three-year deals for a 35-year-old reliever over the past decade. Those came at $7-8MM annually, well below what Suarez will command. Not since Mariano Rivera<\/a> has a reliever this age pulled a three-year contract on eight figure salaries. Suarez will probably take aim at snapping that streak.<\/p>\n

Edwin D\u00edaz<\/a> is the best free agent reliever, but he\u2019s reportedly seeking a five-year contract that approaches or exceeds $100MM. Suarez is the next-best option.\u00a0Pete Fairbanks<\/a>, Luke Weaver<\/a>, Brad Keller<\/a>,\u00a0Kyle Finnegan<\/a> and old friend\u00a0Kenley Jansen<\/a> are also unsigned. While Fairbanks has been a Dodger target in past trade talks, Woo and Ardaya report that L.A. is not among the various teams in his market as a free agent.<\/p>\n

The Dodgers have left-handers\u00a0Alex Vesia<\/a> and\u00a0Tanner Scott<\/a> as their top internal leverage arms.\u00a0Blake Treinen<\/a>,\u00a0Brock Stewart<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Brusdar Graterol<\/a> come with performance and\/or injury questions. They saw\u00a0Michael Kopech<\/a> and\u00a0Kirby Yates<\/a> hit free agency and non-tendered\u00a0Evan Phillips<\/a>\u00a0last month.<\/p>\n

Cutting Phillips was a formality, as he was headed into his final season of arbitration control. The former closer underwent Tommy John surgery in June and might miss the entire 2026 season. President of baseball operations Andrew Friedman told Jack Harris of The Los Angeles Times<\/a> last month that the Dodgers were interested in re-signing the righty, presumably on a two-year contract. Friedman said that Phillips may prefer to wait to sign until after he resumes a throwing program, so it\u2019s possible he\u2019ll remain on the open market all winter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Dodgers are among the teams with interest in free agent closer\u00a0Robert Suarez, report Fabian Ardaya and Katie…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":328676,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,171678,591,33451,85],"class_list":["post-328675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-evan-phillips","tag-mlb","tag-robert-suarez","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=328675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/328676"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}