Tommy Lasorda, who is not interviewing for the Dodger managerial opening, speaks with Andrew Friedman in August. (Jon SooHoo/Los Angeles Dodgers)

By Jon Weisman

OK, so the Dodgers have no new manager or head trainer yet, no new free-agent signings or trades to announce, nothing locked down for the coaching staff.

But with the MLB General Managers meetings underway today through Thursday, Dodger president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman spoke to reporters to provide an offseason update. Here’s a sample of what was said …

On the Hot Stove market: “It’s obviously early in the process. … Right now, I think teams and players are in a fact-finding mode, and trying to get as good a sense as they can of what’s available and what’s possible. … For the most part, we’re going to be focused on pitching.”

What about the pitching staff: “This offseason is different than last in that going into next year, we feel much better about our pitching depth that will be in Oklahoma City. Obviously, (Hyun-Jin) Ryu is a big wild card. (Brandon) McCarthy will get back at some point in the 2016 season. And then you have (Mike) Bolsinger, (Carlos) Frias, Jose De Leon, (Julio) Urias, (Jharel) Cotton, Zach Lee, Joe Wieland. We have a number of guys we like that will be there, and that is a big difference for us just in terms of the depth that we’ll have on hand.

“That being said, we still need to round out our Opening Day pitching staff, and fortunately there are a lot of pitchers on the market, both the free-agent market and some trade conversations we’ve already had, which is a good thing. Really focusing on rounding out our rotation and being opportunistic in the pen is a large part of our focus.”

On talks with Zack Greinke: “Consistent with our policy, we’re not going to address specific conversations we’re having with free-agent players. Obviously, when the opt-out happened, we had conversations, and after that we’re going to leave it up to peoples’ imaginations.”

On the prospects for Ryu in 2016: “Every checkpoint has been incredibly optimistic, and if success were dictated by how hard he has attacked this rehab process, then I’m 100 percent convinced that he’ll be back by Opening Day. But you never really know. Each day, each week, each month gives us more clarity, so I don’t know yet whether we can fully count on him or not. … It is a little bit of a wild card, and we’ll just continue to assess it as regularly as we can.”

Could a young pitcher break into the starting rotation? “A lot of it is going to depend on what our roster looks like at the end of the winter. We have a lot of interesting guys that we like that at this moment are slated to open the year in Triple-A. If we get to the end of the winter and for whatever reason we have potentially have a rotation spot available, it’ll be a really interesting competition among a group of really talented pitchers to figure out what makes the most sense for Opening Day. But I think a number of these guys will impact us at some point in the 2016 season.”

On augmenting the bullpen: “If we can add someone that we can throw into the mix that can get high-leverage outs late in the game, that’s great. But, unfortunately, 29 other teams have the exact same mindset, so we’ll see how this winter shakes out. There are some guys on the free-agent market as well as the trade market that we’ll have on our radar and on our target list that we’ll see if we can figure out a way to acquire.”

On J.P. Howell declining to become a free agent: “I had some conversations. I know he loves it in L.A. — I know he and his wife are really happy. I know that he’s really happy with the team. I was not shocked, but I was certainly curious when the season ended, and during conversations leading up to it, it became more clear that he was going to stay.”

On how to build a championship team: “I don’t think we have a hard and fast rule on that. You look at four teams in the championship series, and all were constructed very differently, and it’s just another illustration of the fact that you can get there in different ways.”

On the nature of the offense: “Again, I don’t do well with hard and fast rules. I would like hitters that are really passive out of the strike zone, and really aggressive inside the strike zone and can hit the ball into the seats. I think there are players who accrue their value in different ways, that we are open-minded to. As a unit we need to do a better job situationally — some of that is personnel-driven, and some of that is a mindset, just continuing to talk to it and reinforce the team offense approach. The Cubs could have gotten to the World Series in theory, and they swung and missed a lot. There’s just a lot of ways to build a championship team. For the most part our core is in place, and we’re excited about that core.”

More on the core: “We’re pretty locked in offensively except for what we’re going to do at second base, whether that’s stay internal or go external. For the most part, our position group is pretty locked down.”

What about second base? “It’s somewhere in between. I think we’re fortunate to have Kiké (Hernandez) and (Jose) Peraza and their ability to bounce around and play different spots or play one spot more often. but we’ll also go out to market and look at the free-agent market as well as trades to see if we can augment our group and add someone who fits really well.”

More on Hernandez: “His track record (has shown) he handled right-handed pitching much better than he did last year. Obviously, he was tremendous against lefties. It was basically his first full season in the Major Leagues, and we’re very optimistic about what he can do going forward. Whether that’s playing second base or continuing to get a lot of at-bats and bouncing around different positions, I’m not sure yet.”

What needs to happen with Yasiel Puig next year: “Putting his body in the best position to play 150-plus games. He has continued to get bigger and stronger each year, and it may not be the optimal size for him to play 150-plus games. So that’s a focus. He’s been getting after it this winter. (Strength and conditioning coach) Brandon McDaniel has talked to him regularly, and the reports have been great. And then also mechanically, when he had the blister issue, he formed some bad habits out of muscle memory trying to overcompensate for the hand, so it’s just getting him back to what he was mechanically.”

On Joc Pederson and Yasmani Grandal, after their second-half struggles: “I expect that both of them will be one of 13 on the position-player group. … We’ll see how what our roster looks like at the end of the winter and as we head into Spring Training, but I’m incredibly optimistic about what those guys can accomplish, and we’ll include Puig in that as well. Those are three big wild cards heading into the 2016 season, that we’ll do everything we can for them to be as good as they can in 2016. If that happens I think we can have a chance to be one of the more dynamic offenses in the National League. … Being around them for a year and seeing their work ethic and what they put into it gives me a lot of optimism that they will be significant contributors for us next year.”

More on Pederson: “He talked about it over the weekend. I just think mechanically, slowly over time, he got into some bad habits. Nobody wanted to correct that as badly as he did. It’s just a really difficult thing to do this season. He’s really focused on it this winter and will work incredibly hard to get back to where he was. You’re not asking them to change and become someone that they’re not. It’s much easier when you’re trying to figure out a way to get someone back to where they were, as opposed to something completely new to him. … I think when Joc’s right, he can hit left-hand pitching. It’s the benefit of having versatility.”

On A.J. Ellis: “We haven’t really gotten to our existing guys in great detail yet, with everything else we’ve had going on, as well as the personnel hirings that we’re doing, so we have not spent a lot of time talking through our existing group that is under control. I’m guessing that in the next few weeks we’ll really bear down on the guys that we have now and what makes the most sense going forward. Obviously A.J. was a large part of our success last year. Both what he contributes on and off the field is certainly not lost on us.”

Something that can be said about the next manager: “We’ll be looking for a manager who can adapt different personnel, and someone who can appreciate the strengths of the guys on our roster at any given time and put them in the best position to succeed.”