Dodgers' Clayton Kershaw, 'one of the best' ever, to retire

 LOS ANGELES -- As Clayton Kershaw navigated a 15-minute news conference -- within an interview room stuffed with teammates, coaches and front office members, along with his pregnant wife and four children -- his emotions often got the best of him, causing intermittent pauses while he tried to contextualize a two-decade career. At one point, he felt the need to clarify something.

"I'm really not sad," Kershaw said. "I'm really not. I'm really at peace with this. It's just emotional. I tried to hold it together. I told our guys not to make it weird today because I was going to get weird if you make it weird. And here I am, making it weird."

Kershaw, 37, announced his retirement Thursday, one day before he is set to make the final regular-season home start of his career from Dodger Stadium.

Over the past few years, Kershaw has waited until the offseason to talk over his baseball future with his wife, Ellen, before returning to the Los Angeles Dodgers. He went into this year with a pretty good idea it would be his last season but kept it quiet "in case I changed my mind," he said. As the season progressed, he informed others. And as the makeup of his final home start became clearer -- Friday, 7:10 p.m. PT against the San Francisco Giants -- Ellen helped convince him to make the announcement ahead of time.

"I'm at peace with it," Kershaw said. "I think it's the right time."

Kershaw has collected three National League Cy Young Awards, an MVP, 11 All-Star Game invites and 222 regular-season victories solely with the Dodgers in an 18-year career -- one that will undoubtedly finish in the Hall of Fame. His 2.54 ERA is the second lowest among pitchers who accumulated at least 1,500 innings in the live ball era (since 1920). His .698 career winning percentage tops all pitchers with at least 200 victories since 1900. His .590 OPS against is the lowest among those who debuted over the past 70 years and racked up at least 2,500 innings, slightly ahead of Nolan Ryan, Pedro Martinez and Bob Gibson.

"I think he's the greatest pitcher in this generation," Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. "There's obviously a lot of great pitchers. I've just never been around a greater competitor. Very accountable, very consistent. He's made me better. And I think that we have grown together, so I feel fortunate to have been able to manage him and be around him for 10 years. He's earned this right to walk away at his choosing."

Among his teammates, Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman was seemingly the first to know that he would retire. Kershaw told him a month or two ago and swore him to secrecy. Freeman kept it to himself and often wondered when it might be announced.

"Knowing Clayton, I thought he would just not even tell anybody and just retire," Freeman said. "But I'm glad he did, so the fans -- and not only Dodger fans, but all baseball fans -- can enjoy his last start here at Dodger Stadium in the regular season tomorrow. It's just a heck of a career. Just in awe of him. When I first came into the league, getting to face him, and then obviously coming over here, it all just gets bigger and bigger. Watching him daily go about his business, what he does day in and day out, not only on the field, off the field, what he's done in communities -- he's just a special person."

When Kershaw raised his arms while jogging out from the right-center-field bullpen in Arlington, Texas, to celebrate a championship Oct. 27, 2020, and finally exorcise the postseason demons that had long haunted him, it almost felt as if an entire baseball-loving community celebrated with him. Kershaw captured the imagination of fans with a stirring run of dominance throughout the 2010s. But he captured their hearts with a type of determination, focus and humility that was obvious to those who watched him from afar. Later in his career, as he navigated through a litany of injuries and somehow remained competitive, he earned undying respect from his peers.

From 2010 to 2019, Kershaw trailed only Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander in wins (156) and innings (1,996) and led all qualified starting pitchers in ERA (2.31). Injuries to his back, elbow, forearm, shoulder, toe and knee severely limited him over the next six years. The quality of his stuff suffered. And yet, Kershaw still has a 2.92 ERA from 2020 to 2025, fourth lowest among those with at least 500 innings in that stretch.

"The teammate he is, the competitor he is," Dodgers shortstop Mookie Betts said when asked to define Kershaw's legacy. "Not just on the mound, but really everything. The person he is. I'll always remember that, and I'll always be able to say Clayton Kershaw is someone that I love. Somebody I love. That's someone I'll always go out of my way to make sure I do right by him. I just appreciate everything that he's meant to the game, meant to the Dodgers and meant to myself."

Kershaw rejoined the Dodgers' rotation in mid-May this year, after offseason knee and toe surgeries, and helped to stabilize a group that had again been ravaged by injuries. On July 2, he became the 20th pitcher to record 3,000 strikeouts. Thirteen days later, he honored Major League Baseball's special invitation to the All-Star Game and addressed his National League teammates before the first pitch. And in August, as the Dodgers' rotation began to round into form, Kershaw elevated to another level, winning all five of his starts while posting a 1.88 ERA.

All told, he is 10-2 with a 3.53 ERA in 20 starts this season, despite throwing the slowest fastball of his career.

"I can't think of a better season to go out," Kershaw said. "We still have a lot to accomplish, obviously, this month, and the last thing I want to do is be a distraction to anybody from accomplishing our ultimate goal -- to win in the last game of the season."

Kershaw was injured when the Dodgers made their run to another championship last fall; now, the question is whether he fits within the current construct. The Dodgers employ four frontline starters in Blake Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow and two-way star Shohei Ohtani, in addition to Emmet Sheehan, a promising young right-hander who has been effective out of the bullpen. Roberts said he believes "there's a role" for Kershaw on the team's postseason roster, though he doesn't know what it would look like and added that it's not just his decision to make.

Kershaw informed Roberts a couple of weeks ago that the 2025 season would be his last. Before Wednesday's game, Kershaw confirmed that he had made a final decision and "was emotional," Roberts said. On Thursday morning, he sent a text message to his teammates -- the vast majority of whom already knew -- to give them a heads-up that his impending retirement would be announced publicly.

"I know he's saying it, and I know it's kind of the reality, but I still don't know if I believe it," Dodgers third baseman Max Muncy said. "For as long as I've been here, it has been '22.' It's a weird day. Kind of a strange day. But at the end of the day, it's one of the best careers we've ever seen, and for me personally, having played behind him for eight or nine years now, it's truly a blessing."

Kershaw spent most of the hours leading up to Thursday's game with his 8-year-old son, Charley, on the field at Dodger Stadium, throwing him batting practice, hitting him fungoes and often sitting with him on the grass. He began his news conference by thanking as many people as he could -- ownership, front office members, coaches, athletic trainers, clubhouse attendants, teammates, friends and family in Dallas -- then read a passage written by Ellen, in which she described the beautiful chaos of raising small children in a major league ballpark.

On Friday, Ellen, their four kids and 50,000-plus people will watch Kershaw pitch at Dodger Stadium for potentially the last time. Asked what he anticipates that being like, Kershaw said: "I anticipate pitching good."

It was a fitting response.

Kershaw has never been interested in the pomp and circumstance.

"You've seen in the past where when guys [announce] it's their last game, they take the field and the whole dugout stays behind," Muncy said. "When it comes to Clayton, nothing would piss him off more if we did something like that. So, for us, we're going to take the field as normal, play as hard as we can and get him the 'W.'"