Los Angeles – While Clayton Kershaw sailed a 15 -minute press conference – in an interview room filled with teammates, coaches and members of the Front Office, as well as his pregnant wife and four children – his emotions have often fired him, causing intermittent breaks while he was trying to contextualize a career of two decades. At one point, he felt the need to clarify something.
“I’m really not sad,” said Kershaw. “I’m really not. I’m really in peace with that. It’s just emotional. I tried to keep it together. I told our guys not to make it weird today because I was going to become weird if you were doing it weird. And I’m here, making him weird.”
Kershaw, 37, announced his retirement on Thursday, one day before he was about to do the last regular season of his Dodger Stadium career.
In recent years, Kershaw has waited for the offseason to talk about his baseball future with his wife, Ellen, before returning to the Los Angeles Dodgers. He entered this year with a fairly good idea that it would be his last season, but kept silent “in case I have changed his mind,” he said. Over the season, he informed the others. And as the composition of her last start at home has become clearer – Friday at 7:10 pm against the Giants of San Francisco – Ellen helped to convince him to make the announcement in advance.
“I’m at peace with that,” said Kershaw. “I think it’s a good time.”
Kershaw raised three Cy Young prizes from the National League, a MVP, 11 invitations to the stars match and 222 regular season victories only with the Dodgers during a career of 18 years – which will undoubtedly end in the renowned temple. Its 2.54 ERA is the second lower among the launchers that have accumulated at least 1,500 rounds in the live ball era (since 1920). His percentage of career victories of .698 exceeds all the launchers with at least 200 victories since 1900. His ops .590 against is the lowest among those who have made their debut in the past 70 years and have accumulated at least 2,500 innings, slightly in front of Nolan Ryan, Pedro Martinez and Bob Gibson.
“I think he is the biggest launcher of this generation,” said Dodgers manager Dave Roberts. “There are obviously a lot of big launchers. I have never been with a bigger competitor. Very responsible, very coherent. He made me better. And I think we grew up together, so I feel lucky to have managed it and be with him for 10 years. He won this right to leave for his choice.”
Among his teammates, the first goal player of the Dodgers, Freddie Freeman, was apparently the first to know that he would retire. Kershaw told him a month or two ago and swore secret. Freeman kept him for him and often wondered when he could be announced.
“Knowing Clayton, I thought he wouldn’t even say to anyone and would not retire,” said Freeman. “But I’m glad he did it, so fans – and not only Dodger fans, but all baseball fans – can take advantage of his latest departure here at the Dodger stadium in the regular season tomorrow. It’s just a big career. In communities – it’s just a special person.”
When Kershaw raised his arms by jogging the enclosure of the right fields in Arlington, Texas, to celebrate a championship on October 27, 2020, and finally exorcise demons in the playoffs which had long forced him with him. Kershaw captured the imagination of fans with a moving domination throughout the 2010s. But he captured their hearts with a type of determination, concentration and humility that was obvious for those who looked at him from afar. Later in his career, while he was sailing through a litany of injuries and remained in a way competitive, he won eternal respect for his peers.
From 2010 to 2019, Kershaw only dragged Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander in victories (156) and sleeves (1,996) and led all qualified departure launchers at the time (2.31). Back injury, elbow, forearm, shoulder, toe and knee have seriously limited it over the next six years. The quality of his things has suffered. And yet, Kershaw still has an MPM of 2.92 from 2020 to 2025, fourth lower among those with at least 500 rounds in this section.
“The teammate he is, the competitor he is,” said the Dodgers, Mookie Betts, when he was asked to define the heritage of Kershaw. “Not only on the mound, but really everything. The person he is. I will always remember, and I will always be able to say that Clayton Kershaw is someone I love. Someone I love. He is someone I will always make me make sure I make sure I do well.”
Kershaw joined the rotation of the Dodgers in mid-May this year, after surgeries of knee and toes, and helped stabilize a group that had been ravaged by injuries again. On July 2, he became the 20th launcher to record 3,000 stick withdrawals. Thirteen days later, he honored the special invitation of the Major Baseball League to the Star match and approached his teammates from the National League before the first throw. And in August, while the rotation of the Dodgers began to end in shape, Kershaw reached another level, winning his five departures while posting an MPM of 1.88.
All in all, he has 10-2 with an MPM of 3.53 in 20 departures this season, despite the launch of the slowest quick ball in his career.
“I can’t think of a better season to go out,” said Kershaw. “We still have a lot to do, of course, this month, and the last thing I want to do is to be a distraction for anyone to reach our ultimate goal – to win in the last game of the season.”
Kershaw was injured when the Dodgers raced towards another championship last fall; Now the question is whether it is part of the current construction. The Dodgers employ four first -line starters at Blake Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow and the double -direction star Shohei Ohtani, in addition to Emmet Sheehan, a promising young law that was effective outside the statements. Roberts said he believed that “there was a role” for Kershaw on the team’s list of qualifying series, although he does not know what it would look like and added that it is not only his decision to make.
Kershaw informed Roberts a few weeks ago that the 2025 season would be the last. Before Wednesday’s match, Kershaw confirmed that he had made a final decision and “was emotional,” said Roberts. Thursday morning, he sent an SMS to his teammates – the vast majority of whom already knew – to give them a warning that his imminent retirement would be announced publicly.
“I know he says it, and I know it’s a kind of reality, but I still don’t know if I believe it,” said the third goal of the Dodgers, Max Muncy. “For as long as I have been here, it has been ’22. ‘It’s a strange day.
Kershaw spent most hours before Thursday’s match with his 8 -year -old son, Charley, on the field at the Dodger Stadium, launching him from the stick training, striking him of Fungo and often sat with him on the grass. He started his press conference by thanking as many people as possible – property, members of the Front Office, coaches, sports coaches, attendants to the clubhouse, teammates, friends and family in Dallas – then read a passage written by Ellen, in which she described the beautiful chaos to raise small children in a major league stadium.
Clayton Kershaw did something more than anything else this afternoon: hang out on the ground with his son, Charley. pic.twitter.com/jmqawazlkg
– Alden Gonzalez (@alden_gonzalez) September 18, 2025
Friday, Ellen, their four children and more than 50,000 people, will watch Kershaw Pitch at the Dodger Stadium for potentially the last time. Asked what he provided that, Kershaw, said: “I expected to launch well.”
It was an appropriate response.
Kershaw has never been interested in the pump and circumstances.
“You have seen in the past where guys [announce] It’s their last match, they take the field and all the canoe is late, “said Muncy.” Regarding Clayton, nothing would piss him off if we were doing something like that. So, for us, we will take the field as usual, play as hard as possible and make him the ‘W.’ “”
