The Dodgers have 14 days to “decide how they will handle” the newly reinstated Trevor Bauer -- whether they will “cut the pitcher...or whether they will continue to roster him,” according to Emma Baccellieri of SI. But the team “shouldn’t need it: They should know where they stand here.” The team has had months to “prepare for a decision like this one,” and now, they “should be ready to act.” Baccellieri: "What can they learn in the next 14 days -- about him or about themselves -- that they have not learned over the last 18 months?" If the Dodgers want to keep Bauer on the roster, they should “say so and explain why.” The same “applies to the opposite decision.” But they have had months to “contemplate what matters to them,” and what price they “might place on those principles, and there is not much to gain by waiting.” The 14-day window marks the end of a “messy, complicated process” that has now “lasted a year and a half.” The team has had months to “consider the questions that it raises.” Baccellieri: "Chief among them are these: "What do the Dodgers care about? At what price? How long should it take them to decide those principles?" To roster Bauer would be to “make an explicit statement about the club’s values and perspective.” To cut him would “do the same," a statement "equal in magnitude, opposite in direction” (SI, 12/22).
WAITING RED FLAG: In L.A., Bill Plaschke writes the decision to keep Bauer “shouldn’t be an option, a question, or even a passing thought.” The Dodgers should "not be enticed by that empty spot on their mound, that empty locker in their clubhouse, or the empty offseason during which they have clearly fallen behind the big-spending" Padres. It should "not matter that every bit of baseball sense says bring him back. Every bit of humanity says not on your life." If the Dodgers brought back Bauer, they would “essentially be rehiring a player who just served the longest sexual assault and domestic violence suspension in the seven-year history of that policy.” The Dodgers already “compromised their history” by acquiring Bauer in the first place, his signing in February 2021 coming “complete with red flags surrounding his internet bullying of women” (L.A. TIMES, 12/23).
