The Dodgers, as they have for the last three season, made a trade in August. This time, they acquired right-handed reliever Ryan Madson from the Washington Nationals for reliever prospect Andrew Istler.
Left-handed reliever Adam Liberatore was designated for assignment to make room for Madson on the 40-man roster.
Madson, coming off a 1.83 ERA/1.99 FIP season in 2017, regressed mightily in 2018. He owns a 5.28 ERA, 4.35 FIP and has been worse than replacement level (-0.1 fWAR). That doesn’t mean we can’t like some things about this trade.