Why Freddie Freeman’s baby daughter is making him re-evaluate his baseball longevity – The Athletic
MILWAUKEE – My question to Los Angeles Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman was straightforward: Is he worried his quest for 3,000 hits might be interrupted by a lockout that forces the cancellation of games next season?
Freeman, 36, answered as you might expect, saying he hopes the owners and players reach a new collective-bargaining agreement without that kind of disruption. He then took the conversation in a different direction, expressing a more profound concern about sticking around long enough to get the 519 hits necessary for 3,000.
“Obviously, getting 3,000 hits would be very, very cool,” Freeman said. “But ever since baby girl came into this world about a month ago, my perspective has changed a little bit on individual stats and how long I would want to play.”
On April 19, Freeman and his wife, Chelsea, became parents to their fourth child and first daughter, London. One of London’s middle names, Rosemary, is in honor of Freeman’s mother, who died of melanoma when he was 10.
Freeman said he still plans to play three more seasons after this one, provided he remains healthy and productive. But he already has spoken with Chelsea about the pangs of regret he is experiencing being away from London.
Leaving for road trips without his sons – Charlie, 9; Brendan, 5; and Maximus, 5 – also is difficult, Freeman said. But the boys love baseball and like watching him play. London will have few memories, if any, of her father in uniform even if he reaches his goal of completing 20 major-league seasons and playing until age 40.
“I’m missing things for something she’ll never know,” Freeman said. “She’s not going to know I missed these things either. But it weighs on me and my heart. I think everybody who knows me knows it weighs on me hard.
“All I ever wanted was a family. But all I ever wanted to do was play baseball, too. It’s such a hard thing, it really is.”
Freeman knows countless people sacrifice family time to put food on the table, many by traveling for work. He understands he is more fortunate than most. His career earnings by the time his contract with the Dodgers expires after next season will be nearly $300 million.
Yet, even though he is a nine-time All-Star, three-time World Series champion and former National League MVP and World Series MVP, he has the same conflicting emotions as any parent who spends time away from their child.
“I don’t like seeing my daughter grow up on a FaceTime call,” Freeman said. “When I’m sitting in a hotel room by myself at night after a game, I’m just like, ‘Oh man, what am I doing?’
“I’m not trying to sound like it’s just me. Believe me, I get it. But when you’ve done a job for as long as I have and achieved almost everything, to be still missing things, that’s what’s hard on older guys in this game.”
That’s Freddie the father talking. Freddie the baseball player is the other factor in this equation. And Freddie the baseball player is still quite capable.
Freeman, who currently is batting .260 with a .803 OPS – “good, but not what I’m accustomed to” – said he never thought about individual milestones as a younger player.
He added that winning remains his priority, and that if he ever got to the point where he was more concerned with individual achievements, it would be a sign he lost his way. But as his career totals began to accumulate, he set three goals – 3,000 hits, 1,000 extra-base hits and 5,000 total bases.
He needs only 31 extra-base hits for 1,000, and this season could become the 40th player in NL history to reach that figure. He is 770 total bases short of 5,000, a total attained by only 22 players. And with a career batting average of .299, he is the active leader in hits, with Jose Altuve next at 2,428. Only 33 have made it to 3,000.
“If I can reach a couple of ‘em, that would be pretty cool,” Freeman said. “I just always viewed myself as trying to be the best hitter I can possibly be. I’ve never changed. There is so much about launch angles, trajectories, hitting home runs. I knew who I was. Being stubborn and knowing who I was, I didn’t want to change.
“(Hitting) .300 means a lot to me. Am I going to end up with a .300 career batting average? As I get older, who knows? I know batting average has gone away. But to me if you hit .300 and you play every day, that means you’re getting on base at least 250 times with hits and walks. That means you’re doing everything you can to help your team.”
As his 37th birthday nears in September, Freeman has rebounded from a mediocre April (.742 OPS) with a strong May (.891). His bat speed remains well below average, but his underlying metrics, from expected batting average and slugging percentage to exit velocity and hard-hit percentage, are ahead of where they were last season. He is a master of the art of hitting – a lost art for many in today’s game.
Such is the focus on metrics, people occasionally lose sight of results. A hard-hit ball that yields an unfavorable outcome is often excused as poor luck. The reverse also is true, with a softly hit ball that finds a hole frequently dismissed as mere happenstance. But, as with anything in baseball, it’s dangerous to speak in absolutes.
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said when a left-handed batter hits a back-door slider with two strikes over the shortstop’s head, that’s not luck, it’s intent. The hitter refused to chase the pitch. He saw it deep. He got his bat to the ball.
“That’s hitting,” Roberts said.
Roberts cited another situation that requires a hitter to take a flexible approach – two on, two outs. At that point, he said, the goal of a hitter should not necessarily be to attain maximum exit velocity or pull the ball in the air.
“You’ve got to get a hit,” Roberts said. “You need to hit the outfield grass. There’s a skill to hitting the outfield grass. How will you do it if you don’t practice it? Freddie practices getting hits. That’s why he’s going to get 3,000 hits.”
With two outs and runners on first and second, Freeman entered Monday with a career .353 batting average and .986 OPS. With two outs and runners on second and third, he was at .311 and .877. Both sets of numbers were well above the current league averages.
Freeman is so skilled in the batter’s box, it would be a shock if he ever stopped hitting successfully. Yet, he is aware decline is inevitable, creating another potential obstacle to 3,000 hits. And he said, somewhat jokingly, that family might be a reason older players regress.
“I’ve always thought Father Time takes you down,” Freeman said. “But I don’t know if it’s Father Time. I think it’s because you miss things with your family and your kids. Maybe that’s the contributing factor to older guys not playing as good. One, you have four kids. You’re tired all the time. That 98 looks a little bit faster when you’re a little sleepy.”
He is adamant he doesn’t “want to be a lug out there,” taking up a roster spot, dragging down his team. But he isn’t close to that point yet. And even with London pulling at his heart, a recent conversation with his grandfather, Ed, struck a chord.
“He was like, ‘You’re going to be the best dad, the best husband, for the next 50 years. You only have a few years of this left,’” Freeman said. “Then I was like, that makes a whole lot of sense.”
Yet, during the course of our 10-minute conversation, Freeman kept going back and forth.
His love for his children was publicly evident in 2024 when he held a tearful news conference detailing the struggles of his son Maximus, who was diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disease, Guillain-Barré syndrome, that left him temporarily paralyzed.
Maximus recovered, and now Freeman’s parental concerns are more mundane. Going months without seeing his oldest son Charlie’s flag football games and practices. The possibility he will miss London’s first steps. All the things that, as a new girl dad, leave him wistful.
He loves baseball. He says it has given him everything. But London Rosemary Joy Freeman is leaving him torn about how long he wants to keep going.
“I feel good. My body feels good. We’ll see,” Freeman said. “There are so many factors in life that come along.”
