The Dodgers don't have a written "criteria" for retiring uniform numbers. But with one notable exception, each of the franchise's retired numbers was worn by a player who played a majority of his career with the Dodgers and was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.
The one exception is longtime Dodger Jim Gilliam, who was the club's first-base coach when he died at age 49 just before the start of the 1978 World Series. His number was immediately retired.