Baseball may be trapped in a two-party system

Hope springs eternal. With Opening Day 2025 under our belts, however, you cannot shake the feeling that America’s pastime, like its politics, is a two-party system. The Los Angeles Dodgers enter the season as the incumbent World Series champions, having triumphed over the New York Yankees last October. Who expects this year to be much different?

Here is a quick rundown of the Dodgers offseason coup: two-time Cy Young winner Blake Snell and international phenomenon Roki Sasaki bolster an already stellar rotation featuring Tyler Glasnow, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Tony Gonsolin. And just in case that’s not enough, their best offseason pitching acquisition is reigning MVP Shohei Ohtani, fresh from becoming the first player in history to slug fifty home runs and steal fifty bases. He will resume pitching duties around mid-May.

Dodgers president Andrew Friedman is stacking the cabinet with intent, fortifying the bullpen with elite relievers Tanner Scott and Kirby Yates while retaining Blake Treinen’s veteran grit to lock down late innings. Offensively, “Mr. 50-50” Ohtani sits atop a juggernaut lineup, flanked by Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman, with postseason heroes Teoscar Hernández and Tommy Edman back in the fold after re-signing multi-year deals. Newcomer Michael Conforto brings left-handed pop to the outfield, while KBO standout Hyeseong Kim adds speed and versatility across the infield. Three-true-outcomes specialist Max Muncy delivers a high on-base clip with his own knack for finding the seats, rounded out by All-Star catcher Will Smith, fresh off his ten-year extension, steering a five-, six-, or perhaps even seven-man rotation of aces.

Boasting this blend of star power, strategic acquisitions, and unmatched organizational depth, the Dodgers aren’t just favorites to repeat — they’re forging a near-certain dynasty, with PECOTA projecting 104 wins and a 99.7 percent lock on the postseason. Las Vegas sets them at +240 to claim the World Series crown; for perspective, the White Sox averaged a +238 line during a thirty-game skid from August 9 to September 11 last season — a stretch in which Vegas gave them roughly the same odds of stealing a single win as it now gives the Dodgers to snag the win, the clinching game of the 2025 World Series.

The only thing standing in the way of Ohtani and crew’s repeat hopes, at least according to Vegas, is the most evil empire of all. The New York Yankees strut into this season with a little spring in their step even with fresh memories of Aaron Judge’s Game 5 dropped fly that handed the Dodgers the series. The Yankees scrapped the long-held company prohibition against facial hair to distract from losing Juan Soto, who dashed to Queens on a contract worth $765 million for fifteen years. But Brian Cashman, the Yankees general manager, has recalibrated the party platform with brilliance, bringing in Cody Bellinger — whose lefty bat is tailor-made for Yankee Stadium’s short right field and could net seven to ten extra homers if his 2024 Wrigley Field spray chart holds true — and Paul Goldschmidt to steady first, lending this lineup a rugged new grit.

The Yankees landed free-agent prize Max Fried to pair with Gerrit Cole and Carlos Rodón atop a pitching rotation with downward bite, while Devin Williams — nabbed from Milwaukee for Nestor Cortes and Caleb Durbin — will be sealing the ninth with his “Airbender” changeup, a pitch opponents have hit just .138 against in his career.

Returning on offense, in support of newcomers Bellinger and Goldschmidt, five-time top-100 prospect Jasson Dominguez steps up full-time, still rookie-eligible for ’25, and Giancarlo Stanton’s health becomes pivotal — last year, the Yankees went 70-39 (.642) in his starts, but slumped to 24-29 (.453) without him among the start- ing nine. Jazz Chisholm Jr. adds a full season of spark, while an improving young core of Anthony Volpe, Austin Wells and Oswaldo Cabrera fuels the lineup, joining Judge — burning to erase that October unraveling — in a retooled coalition primed to turn last year’s flop into a vengeance tour over the Dodgers’ opposition.

Americans have always liked an underdog — it’s why so many of them were chomping at the bit for a Bills-Commanders Super Bowl. Those hoping to see the Dodgers brought to Earth without obnoxious Pinstripes may not like their other options.

“It’s always sunny in Philadelphia,” but the sky has been dimmed for the Phillies since their magical 2022 World Series run, with their fortunes trending downward. Still, this team, led by Bryce Harper, stands poised to reclaim the National League pennant after a quiet, strategic off-season. They’ve added everyday outfielder Max Kepler and starter Jesús Luzardo and replaced departed reliever Jeff Hoffman with Jordan Romano, building a coalition to challenge the Dodgers’ dynasty.

Yet their lineup betrays old habits. For three seasons, Kyle Schwarber has led off, and he has done quite well, reaching base frequently and even smashing thirty-three leadoff homers — but he is misplaced. Tradition demands speed atop the lineup, and Trea Turner’s wheels tempt a shift. I say tradition, in this case, is worse — an anachronism — and irrefutable numbers prove it.

Last year, MLB leadoff men had 10 percent more impact plate appearances — defined as chances to tie or take the lead — than their three-hole counterparts, spiking to 13.0 percent after the first inning before settling at 13.4 percent more in the ninth or later, plus thirty-three additional plate appearances throughout the season.

For the Phillies this is particularly true as, over the past three years, their leadoff spot has averaged just one fewer at-bat with runners in scoring position than the three-hole — again, that is per season, and it is independent of whether or not they have the ability to make a major impact on a game or not. That is what Philadelphia is trading 7.5 games worth of plate appearances by Harper with a 10 percent increase in impact at-bats for — one single opportunity with runners in scoring position over the course of 162 games, on average. The fix is simple: bat Harper leadoff.

The universal DH uniquely makes a one to ten lineup approach possible, wherein the bottom of the lineup can function as those more traditional top-of-the-lineup bats, allowing the best player to both kick things off at the beginning of the game and then, soon after, fill that more traditional three-hole hitter, as the “tenth hitter,” before ten outs are recorded, every single game, simultaneously maximizing his opportunities to come to the place and those total clutch chances.

Ditching baseball’s unwritten playbook — speed-first tradition or Moneyball’s “because he gets on base” mentality — the Phillies could shake the Dodgers’ reign. Harper’s leadoff revolution would prove no minor tweak; it is a ballot-shifting strike at rewriting the National League’s script this year. The Dodgers stumbled into this wisdom last season when Betts’s injury thrust Ohtani into the leadoff slot, and his slugging ignited a surge. By Betts’s return, LA saw no need to shift a lineup thriving with its best hitter upfront.

If the revolution is not televised in Philadelphia, there is an old-fashioned American solution to the problem of a Dodgers dynasty: if you can’t win the title, buy it.

Enter the New York Mets, where Steve Cohen has donned the crown of baseball’s ultimate usurper, snatching Soto with a gargantuan contract. Cohen is positioning the Mets as the insurgent force to storm the two-party fortress of the Dodgers and Yankees. Soto, who battered LA with a .313/.522/.563 slash line in the last World Series, now anchors a lineup primed to shake the National League to its core. Cohen’s vision isn’t just about contention — it’s about conquest. Soto’s signing, along with pitching upgrades Frankie Montas and Clay Holmes, isn’t a subtle jab at the Dodgers’ dynasty or the Yankees’ empire; it’s a brazen raid, fueled by a billionaire’s checkbook and a superstar’s bat.

Unlike the Phillies’ tactical revolution, the Mets wield raw power and audacity, a third-party uprising poised to steal October from the two-party giants, an underdog with teeth. Whether this insurgency shatters the duopoly or cracks under bought expectation is the wager — Cohen’s Mets don’t just want a seat; they’re here to flip the table.

The Atlanta Braves step into this year as the oldest continuously operating professional sports franchise in North America, a lineage tracing back to 1871 as the Boston Red Stockings. No splashy usurper like Cohen’s Mets, they’re a native force, weathered by last year’s injury storm — Ronald Acuña Jr.’s ACL tear, Spencer Strider’s elbow surgery — and now the exodus of Max Fried to the Yankees and Charlie Morton to the Orioles. Yet, with Chris Sale’s Cy Young glow, Strider’s looming return, and Reynaldo López’s breakout, their pitching roots run deep with a line-up bolstered by Jurickson Profar’s bat to patch the outfield while Acuña heals.

The Braves’ revolt isn’t loud, but it’s lethal. Austin Riley and Matt Olson anchor a lineup that slumped last year — Olson’s .389 slugging a far cry from his fifty-four-homer 2023 — while Ozzie Albies’s return after being off with a broken wrist adds spark, and Profar’s consistency steadies the outfield. Even battered by last year’s injuries, they still battled the Phillies and Mets down the stretch. When whole, the Braves pose a real test for their NL foes and a wildcard threat to the Dodgers’ bid for the crown in October.

Vegas sees the NL’s pennant path running through the East — if not LA, it’s the Braves as the second-most- likely foe for the Yankees’ empire. No bought hype here — injuries derailed their run of five straight NL East crowns from 2018 to 2023, but the blaze of Acuña and Strider returning stokes an uprising. The duopoly may crumble if this revolt peaks in October — less a flash of usurpation, more a relentless grind to uproot baseball’s two-party reign.

If the Dodgers are to be dethroned and their dynasty forestalled, the NL East — a revolution in Philly, Cohen’s Mets insurgency, or Atlanta’s native grit — stands as the most likely crucible.

The Dodgers’ path to October is likely to run through one of these three, and if any can catch fire, the NL pennant could slip from Friedman’s grasp. Beyond them, the league’s challengers feel like third-party dreamers, loud with promise but light on votes.

So, baseball braces for another Dodgers-Yankees scrum, a duopoly less about parity than power. The NL East has the best shot to stop LA, if only they don’t kill each other first. Unless the East steps up, the dynasty takes hold, and America’s pastime proves, once again, that two teams rule.

This article was originally published in The Spectator’s April 2025 World edition.