The Los Angeles Dodgers won the World Series last year. They signed the two best free agents on the market. They've got the main character on their team. They are, by almost every measure, the most dominant franchise in baseball right now.
They are also dead last in ABS challenge value this Spring Training.
The Numbers
Through games played on 3/21, the Dodgers have gone 19-for-45 on challenges for a 42.2% win rate. That's 2nd-worst in baseball, ahead of only the Rangers (41.3%). The league average is hovering around 51.7%.
Their net challenge value in run expectancy is 1.93 runs, which is last place out of all 30 teams. For comparison, the league median is around 4.8 runs. Miami leads at 7.04.
In WPA terms it's not much better. Their +8.4% net WPA from challenges is also last place. St. Louis is at +78.5%.
Part of it is a volume problem. Their COE (Challenges Over Expected) is 4th lowest in the league at -9.62, meaning they're actually challenging way less than the model expects given what they've been presented.
Where Are They Missing?
This is where it gets interesting. I plotted every upheld Dodgers challenge on the strike zone to see if there's a pattern.
Where the Dodgers Are Getting It Wrong
Upheld challenges and missed opportunities plotted on the zone
Batter challenges lost
Catcher challenges lost
Tap a dot to see details
There's a clear pattern on both sides, and it's the same problem from opposite perspectives.
Batters are challenging called strikes that are actually in the zone. 9 of their 13 upheld batter challenges were on pitches more than 1 inch inside the zone by ABS measurement. 6 of the 13 cluster on the left edge of the zone. These are corner pitches that look like they might be off the plate but aren't.
Catchers and pitchers have the mirror image problem. 10 of their 13 upheld challenges were on pitches off the horizontal edges, with 7 of those off the right side. They're challenging balls that they think caught the corner but didn't.
Both sides can't read the corners. Batters think corner strikes are balls. Catchers think corner balls are strikes.
Toggle over to the missed opportunities view and you'll see 84 batter misses and 53 catcher misses scattered all over the zone. That's value they're leaving on the table every game.
Challenge Selection
The Dodgers' xChall% (the model's average predicted challenge probability for the pitches they actually challenged) is 13.4%. That's 2nd-lowest in the league, 22% below the league average of 17.2%. In other words, the pitches they're choosing to challenge are ones the model doesn't expect them to challenge. They're picking fights they shouldn't be picking.
Challenge Selection by Leverage
How often the Dodgers challenge vs let it go, by callLI bucket
This chart shows their challenges vs missed opportunities grouped by callLI. Higher callLI means the pitch mattered more to the game. Orange is what they challenged, gray is what they let go.
47% of their challenges came on pitches with a callLI under 0.5, meaning well below-average leverage. Meanwhile they let 12 missed opportunities go with a callLI of 2.0 or higher, including a 17.3% WPA pitch that Dalton Rushing didn't challenge at callLI 11.37. He also let a 14.0% WPA pitch go as a catcher at callLI 9.19. Two of the three worst missed opportunities in all of Spring Training belong to the same guy.
Here's every team's challenge rate on high leverage opportunities (callLI 2.0+):
High Leverage Challenge Rate by Team
Overturned / total overturnable pitches when callLI >= 2.0
The Dodgers have overturned just 1 of 12 overturnable high leverage pitches this Spring Training, tied for 2nd-worst in MLB.
League average: 37%
When Teams Lose Their Challenges
Median inning of upheld challenges by team
Median inning when teams lose their first challenge (going from 2 remaining to 1).
Games With Zero Challenge Wins
Games where a team challenged at least once and won none
The Roster
A few names stand out.
Eliezer Alfonzo is 2-for-10 with a 20% win rate. He's the Dodgers' most active challenger and their worst. His COE is +4.13, meaning he's challenging about 4 more times than the model would expect given the pitches he's seeing. Five of his upheld catcher challenges were on pitches off the right edge of the plate. He's consistently thinking pitches that are 0.3 to 1.5 inches off the outside corner caught the zone. They didn't.
Dalton Rushing is 5-for-11. That's better but still below average, and he's been a big part of the defensive challenge problem with 4 upheld catcher challenges of his own.
Will Smith and Freddie Freeman are a combined 0-for-3. Will Smith challenged a pitch that was 2.3 inches inside the zone. Freddie challenged one that was 1.6 inches inside. These are two of the best players in baseball challenging pitches that are comfortably in the strike zone.
To be clear, everyone has bad challenges. The difference is the rate. The Cardinals are winning 65.1% of theirs. The Reds and Mariners are both at 62.3%. The Dodgers are at 42.2%.
Where Upheld Challenges Cluster
League-wide heatmap of upheld challenges by zone location
Tap a cell to see detailsHover over a cell to see details
Caveats
This is Spring Training. Rosters look different. Intensity is lower. Some of these players won't be on the Opening Day roster. Alfonzo's 10 challenges aren't going to carry the same weight when the regular season starts and the sample sizes grow.
But the pattern is real. The data doesn't lie about where these pitches are. And the Dodgers' inability to read the corners is consistent across multiple players and multiple weeks of games. Whether this carries into the regular season is an open question, but right now, it's the most clear-cut weakness this team has.
You can dig into every individual challenge on the Dodgers team page.
Nate