The aftermath of Dodgers trades that did and didn’t happen

Joc Pederson and Ross Stripling, now with the Giants, recalled the five days in February 2020 they thought they were going to be Angels, before the deal fell through. From Evan Webeck at The Mercury News:

“Joc’s a nervous body, for sure,” Stripling said. “He was calling me quite a bit. We were definitely nervous. It’s kind of funny we were in that bucket together, texting each other. I think our wives were texting each other. We were stressed for sure. The unknown is stressful.”

Fernando Valenzuela gets his number 34 retired by the Dodgers on Friday at Dodger Stadium.

Over at his Slayed By Voices newsletter, Jon Weisman ranked the 15 most important moments in Valenzuela’s Dodgers career.

With a spate of would-be errors being called hits by official scorers throughout Major League Baseball, Andy McCullough and Zack Meisel at The Athletic looked at various reasons why this is the case. Among them is the rise of gambling, including this quote from MLB chief operations and strategy officer Chris Marinak:

Marinak said that they would be striving for consistency and uniformity in scoring regardless of whether betting was now legalized, but acknowledged that sports betting is a consideration. “The fact that sports betting got legalized in the United States, however many years ago, I think by definition it has an impact on the level of attention we pay to integrity with regards to the scoring process,” he said. “There’s no question about it.”

Two sides of trade deadline goodbyes

On Wednesday night at Fenway Park, the Red Sox gave away a Kiké Hernández bobblehead to the first 7,500 fans, which was planned well before the jack of all trades was traded back to the Dodgers on July 25. The team reached out to Hernández for his blessing to still give away the bobbleheads after the trade, writes Chris Cotillo at MassLive.

Cotillo shared a picture of the bobblehead box, which included this message from Hernández: “Thank you to the organization, to the fans, to the city — you will always represent some of the most meaningful years of my life. Calling Fenway home was and will always be a privlege that I never took for granted.”

On the other side, Justin Bruihl was traded to the Rockies on August 1 after getting designated for assignment by the Dodgers four days earlier. Bruihl is currently with the Albuquerque Isotopes in Triple-A. On Tuesday, he posted on Instagram about leaving the Dodgers, with whom he pitched parts for three seasons after signing as an undrafted free agent out of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in 2017.

“To the @dodgers organization and the city of LA… thank you for taking a young kid in and making his dreams come true! The last 6 years with this organization have been the best years of my life,” Bruihl wrote. “I can’t thank all the fans, coaches, staff and teammates enough for their support. Just wanted to share some of my best memories over the last couple years. Can’t wait for what’s to come with the @rockies”