November 19th, 2023 at 9:00 am 
by Ron Cervenka It was a game changer. An art. A skill. And it was a key to the Dodgers enormous success “back in the day,” as veteran (old) Dodgers fans say today.
It is, of course, the stolen base.
There is no disputing that today’s opposing pitchers and most certainly today’s opposing catchers work long and hard at keeping baserunners close, with their remarkable pickoff moves and throw-downs. And even though the Dodgers were successful in 105 of their 130 stolen base attempts for a respectable 80.7692% success rate during the 2023 regular season, this ranked 19th among Major League Baseball’s 30 teams and 11th among the National League’s 15 teams – this from a team managed by one of MLB’s most successful base stealers in Dave Roberts, who stole 243 bases over his 10-year MLB playing career while being caught only 58 times for an impressive 76.131% success rate.
During the 2023 regular season, Roberts’ team successfully stole second base 98 times and third base seven times, while being caught 22 times and two times respectively. They were unsuccessful in their one attempted to steal home.
No true Dodgers fan (at least those who were alive at the time) will ever forget the historic 1962 season of seven-time All-Star, three-time World Series Champion, former MLB, World Series, and All-Star MVP Dodgers infielder Maury Wills, who was also a two-time Gold Glove winner. When Wills retired from the game in 1972, his 586 steals were the (then) most all-time in MLB history, breaking Ty Cobb‘s (then) seemingly unbreakable MLB record of 96 steals set in 1929. Sadly, the extremely popular Washington, DC native and former Dodgers great passed at his home in Sedona, AZ on September 19, 2022, just 13 days shy of his 90th birthday.
Getting back to the 2023 Dodgers, popular Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman led Roberts’ team with his 23 steals, followed by outfielder James Outman and utility infielder/outfielder Chris Taylor, who both had 16 steals, and (almost MLB MVP) Dodgers outfielder Mookie Betts, with 14 swipes. Unfortunately after that, the other 14 members of the Dodgers offense had a combined 38 stolen bases.
With all due respect to Dave Roberts and his entire coaching staff, this is not the mark of a (hopefully) World Series-bound team.
Play Ball!
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Posted in 
My 2 cents — this is not a manager or coaching issue, it is a baseball operations systemic problem. From day 1, Friedman and his analytics staff have poo pooed stolen bases as an offensive strategy. Then, when MLB and the Players Association agreed to rules changes, the Dodgers failed to adjust — continuing to disdain stolen bases and initially ignoring the impact of other teams stealing at will against the Dodgers pitchers.
Not only failing to adjust to the stolen base on the offensive front, but the defense too was overlooked and the changes made the game planners look silly. Barnes needs to go and a true defensive catcher needs to be the backup. Barnes provides nothing. The dodgers need an athletic catcher who can come up firing to any base. Smith can improve because of his age and overall skill set but the players in the minors need to make adjustments now.