The Dodgers keep coming. Not only do they keep coming, they force other contenders to come after them, in their division, in their league and from the other league.

Walker Buehler, who got the last three outs of the World Series out of the bullpen, just left as a free agent for the Red Sox. But now the Dodgers are reportedly bringing back Teoscar Hern¨¢ndez, who got such big World Series hits for them. And they are reported to be the favorites to land this year¡¯s star Japanese pitcher, Roki Sasaki, the way they did with Yoshinobu Yamamoto in the same baseball winter when the Dodgers won the Shohei Ohtani Sweepstakes.

By the way? Unless there are setbacks, the Dodgers expect Ohtani to be in their starting rotation at some point in this upcoming season, which will almost feel as if they¡¯ve added another star Japanese-born pitcher.

¡°You guys don¡¯t back up, do you?¡± I asked Dodgers manager Dave Roberts on Saturday.

His response was this: ¡°No, sir, we don¡¯t.¡±

The Dodgers are back at the top of the sport, and because they are, and because of the way they don¡¯t back up, they absolutely force other teams to do the same.

The Diamondbacks -- who were in the World Series just 14 months ago and only missed out on being back in the playoffs this time on the last day of the regular season -- just reportedly signed their own free-agent pitcher, Corbin Burnes, for $210 million. The D-backs finished third in the NL West, behind the Dodgers and Padres, but signing Burnes and signing him for big money is a sign that they aren¡¯t willing to concede anything in the West.

The Mets? They went six hard games against the Dodgers in the NLCS last October. As much and as well as the Dodgers spend money, Mets owner Steve Cohen just spent $765 million of it on Juan Soto and $75 million on top of that to bring back starting pitcher Sean Manaea. They still might bring back Pete Alonso, one of the best home run hitters they¡¯ve ever had.

Then there are the Yankees. Remember them? They lost Soto to the Mets, but have now added Max Fried to their rotation, Devin Williams as their closer and two former MVPs, Cody Bellinger and Paul Goldschmidt (reportedly), to their batting order. The Yankees, of course, went five games with the Dodgers in the World Series and looked as if they might go deeper than that before the Dodgers rang them up for five runs in the top of the fifth of Game 5, at a time when they were losing that game, 5-0.

The Yankees hadn¡¯t made it to the World Series in 15 years. But just making it is clearly not enough. They threw their own money at Soto, too, before losing him to the Mets in the end. It¡¯s quite clear they want what the Dodgers have. So do the Diamondbacks and Mets. And you know the Padres will likely be in it to the finish on Sasaki, and not just because they don¡¯t want the Dodgers to get him. It¡¯s also because they know how close they came to taking out the eventual champs before they got anywhere near the World Series.

The Padres and everybody else know what they¡¯re up against when they go up against the Dodgers: The money behind them from Guggenheim Baseball Management. The Hollywood stage. A tremendous management and scouting team led by Andrew Friedman. A great manager in Roberts, coming off the best work of his career. Then there are the three MVPs at the top of Roberts¡¯ batting order: Mookie Betts, Ohtani and Freddie Freeman.

Freeman just added another MVP award to his own distinguished career by winning the World Series MVP, and is the guy who produced the biggest swing of that Series and maybe the whole season when he hit that walk-off grand slam in the 10th inning of Game 1.

Now, the Dodgers have reportedly signed up Hern¨¢ndez for the next three seasons. All he did in the Dodgers' comeback in Game 5 of the Series was hit a double that ended up bouncing off the wall in left-center to make it a tie game at 5. Roberts is a fan, to say the least. Not just because of that swing, but because Hern¨¢ndez was there for him practically every day last season.

¡°There¡¯s not a whole lot of guys that start [154] ballgames and post and then be that productive,¡± Roberts said a few weeks ago.

The Mets were also reported to have had interest in Hern¨¢ndez. They didn¡¯t get him. The Dodgers did. They don¡¯t always get their man, but they sure do most of the time. They might even have the game¡¯s most innovative accountants, after the way they partnered with Ohtani on deferring so much of his $700 million contract.

Does this all mean they¡¯re a lock to win two World Series in a row? They¡¯re not. We all saw how close they were to getting bounced by the Padres in the NLDS before shutting the Padres out in Games 4 and 5, one of those a bullpen game. The Dodgers didn¡¯t get bounced. They kept going all the way to their World Series parade. And they could do it again.