Los Angeles Dodgers: Revisiting Joe Kelly deal after first season

Joe Kelly helped provide the Red Sox a World Series in 2018, so he received more money than he should’ve so let’s look back at his first year with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The Los Angeles Dodgers needed to upgrade their bullpen after falling short in the World Series against the Boston Red Sox, but they didn’t assemble the right pieces in 2019, and one of them was Joe Kelly, who was a key reliever in the Red Sox championship run.

I think Andrew Friedman may have judged Joe Kelly with a little of recency bias. He saw up close how much Kelly dominated his team and he said: “I want that guy”. And he was wrong.

Don’t get me wrong, Joe Kelly was still a good reliever for the Los Angeles Dodgers in the regular season. He just wasn’t that good in the postseason, when everything matters.

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Dodgers fans aren’t worried about getting in the postseason, they are worried about getting over the hump in the postseason, something they haven’t been able to do since 1988.

When the Dodgers signed Joe Kelly to a 3 year, $25 million contract they thought they would give them the same October performance he gave the Red Sox a year ago, but that wasn’t the case.

He was fine in his first outing of the postseason in the National League Division Series, but then it went pretty downhill pretty fast.

In Game 3, he didn’t get one single out, giving up two earned runs and walked three. The most memorable (or unmemorable for Dodgers fans) moment for Joe Kelly was in the decisive Game 5 at Dodger Stadium.

In that relief appearance, he loaded the bases when Dave Roberts signaled the intentional walk to Juan Soto instead of bringing in Adam Kolerak even though his job was pretty much to get Soto out. Roberts then let Kelly face former Dodger infielder Howie Kendrick, which was a move that ended the Dodgers season.

Of course, Joe Kelly gave up a grand slam off of Kendrick’s bat that landed in the center field bleachers as Cody Bellinger watched his team’s season go down the drain.

Now, as I have said Joe Kelly still had a decent season, but Dodgers fans are questioning the dollar amount that he was given because of his postseason troubles.