LOS ANGELES — The party’s over and now the Los Angeles Dodgers are turning to 2026 with designs on winning a third consecutive World Series.“What’s better than two?” manager Dave Roberts asked at the team’s rally at Dodger Stadium on Monday. “Three — three-peat! Three-peat!”Roberts said he’d gotten permission from his friend Pat Riley to use the phrase that the Miami Heat president trademarked in 1988.Soft-spoken and rarely seen team owner Mark Walter vowed to be “back next year” for another championship celebration.First baseman Freddie Freeman told a sold out crowd, “Job in 2024, done. Job in 2025, done. Job in 2026 starts now.”With three titles in the last six years, the Dodgers next will attempt to equal the New York Yankees, who were the last team to win three consecutive championships from 1998-2000. “I’m already thinking about the third time we’re going to do this,” two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani said.It certainly seems possible. The team brings back all of its biggest names, alternately striking fear and grudging admiration in the hearts of baseball’s other 29 teams. Los Angeles opened as +350 World Series favorites for 2026, according to Bet MGM Sportsbook.Andrew Friedman, president of baseball operations, has already referred to this time as “the golden era of Dodgers baseball.”Throw in five National League pennants in the last nine years and 12 NL West titles in 13 years and, well, the word dynasty is becoming synonymous with the Dodgers.“I think definitionally it’s a dynasty,” Friedman said. “For me, it’s still evolving and growing and we want to add to it and we want to continue it and do everything we can to put it at a level where people after us have a hard time reaching.”The Dodgers won the title last year mixing and matching their relievers. This season, the starting rotation survived a string of injuries to return in time to pitch the team to its ninth World Series title in franchise history.“It’s really an exceptional, exceptional staff,” Phillies president Dave Dombrowski said after his team lost to the Dodgers in the NL Division Series. “If you’re going to beat them, you’re really going to have to do everything right.”Ohtani was brought along slowly in his return to the mound this seas …
