Dodgers say goodbye to Cody Bellinger

Friday’s news of Cody Bellinger getting non-tendered by the Dodgers was expected, but still a bummer after all the center fielder has done for the franchise in six years. That’s the focus of a rare weekend Leading Off with True Blue LA podcast.

Bellinger won an MVP award with the Dodgers, won Rookie of the Year, and won a pennant with a home run in Game 7 of the 2020 NLCS. But his last two years were dismal, including a cursed 2021 in which he was recovering from shoulder surgery then broke his tibia and missed time with broken ribs and a hamstring strain.

Despite being relatively healthy in 2022, Bellinger couldn’t quite turn things around offensively, and was still well below average at the plate.

“Last offseason, I was very confident and it didn’t prove out in ‘22,” Andrew Friedman said in a Zoom call Friday. “I remain confident.”

Bellinger’s move wasn’t the only Dodgers transaction on Friday. They also non-tendered both Edwin Ríos and Luke Williams, and claimed Jake Reed off waivers for a third go around with Los Angeles.

In addition to looking at where the Dodgers outfield stands at the moment, also on the podcast we recap the voting for both the National League Cy Young Award and NL MVP, the latter including a classic outlier ballot.

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Episode link (time: 21:30)