Will this nightmare ever end? The Dodgers lose again 5-4 to the Rockies. The Dodgers have now lost 13 of 14. Last night Clayton Kershaw couldn’t right the ship. So today with the return of Corey Seager, coupled with Yu Darvish on the mound, the Dodgers hoped to turn the tide against German Vazquez.
In the first ining, Cargo hit a solo shot off Darvish and gave the Rockies a 1-0 lead. Felt like Deja vu all over again. The Dodgers fought back in the bottom half of the inning. Curtis Granderson hit a single. Justin Turner hit a two run shot that awoke the Dodger stadium crowd. Cody Bellinger then legged out an infield hit on an error by the Rockies. He then advanced to second on a wild pitch.
Yasiel Puig hit a grounder advancing Bellinger to third. Joc Pederson then walked and Austin Barnes hit a double to score two runs and the Dodgers took a 4-1 lead. All felt right in the world. Yu Darvish’s ball had a lot of movement and he got into a grove. In the bottom of the fourth, Dodgers had runners on 2nd and 3rd with one out and Justin Turner and Cody Bellinger coming up. Turner struck out and Bellinger flied out to squander that opportunity.
The top of the Fifth doomed the Dodgers. Alexi Amarista doubled on an error by Granderson. Darvish then walked Jonathan Lucroy. Pinch-Hitter Raimel Tapia of the Rockies doubled in two runs, Joc Pederson dove for the ball but couldn’t make the catch. Charlie Blackmon then doubled in a run to tie the score. D.J. LeMahieu then doubled in a run to take the lead.
In the bottom of the sixth the Dodgers would squander another opportunity. Enrique Hernandez then legged out an infield hit then ended up on 2nd due to an error. He was on 2nd with no one out. Granderson could’ve bunted him to 3rd but instead struck out. Seager then flied out, followed by Turner flying out. The defense failed the Dodgers today. The bullpen did a great job keeping the Dodgers in the game.
The offense just squandered to many opportunities. In the bottom of the 8th, Chase Utley who pinch-hit for Logan Forsythe drew a walk. Thank god Dave Roberts put Forsythe on the bench. Forsythe must have blackmail material on Roberts because for the life of me I can’t figure out why he still plays. Yasmani Grandal then came up to pinch-hit. Opportunity to bunt Utley over to 2nd since the offense is struggling. Grandal struck out and that pretty much wrapped up the game.
Arizona lost so the Dodgers still have a 10 game lead in the division. The Dodgers only have a 5 game lead for home field throughout the playoffs. The magic number for the Dodgers is at 12. Alex Wood will try to stop the bleeding tomorrow.
James Moya
Hi I’m James Moya. I am an avid Dodgers fan. I graduated Cal State Fullerton with a Bachelors in Communications. I used to freelance at the San Bernardino Sun. I’m excited about this opportunity to write for LA Dodger Report to gain experience. I’m a straight shooter on my opinions and I hope to get some good conversations going. My dream has always been to report on the Dodgers because Baseball is the National Past-time. I hope you enjoy the ride with me.
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We are in the midst of an historic meltdown. What this has me questioning is why were we so good for so long? The position of the planets? It’s as good a guess as any. But, seriously, what is to be done? Besides cashing out of several players who cannot take us to the next level, or even maintain a decent level of play throughout the season, what is there to be done?
Yu Darvish is currently our worst starter with the highest ERA of all starters. He will be a free agent after the season. Should the Dodgers take a chance on him? I don’t think I would. He is currently making $11Mill.
Logan Forsythe. Club option at $8.5M. $1M buyout. Any takers? He can’t seem to find himself with the Dodgers. Will he be another Reddick? He’s batting .312 with Houston.
Andre Ethier. $17.5M. Yikes!! $2.5M buyout. Bye bye.
Chase Utley. $2M. I would let him walk. Good player, but we need to address 2B permanently.
Tony Watson. $5.6M. Let him go.
Granderson. $15M. No thanks.
I would welcome a re-build of the starting pitching. We need to add another major producer to replace Yu.
FAZ don’t seem to do too well signing players to add to the team’s core. They rely on guesswork (stats) and buying/trading cheap. This is not their strong point. IMO, the keepers are:
Taylor, Seager, Turner, Bellinger, and Barnes. Of course, we can’t flip our other players but we can be open for business. I’m even willing to trade Puig (marginal), Pederson, Grandal, Hernandez, & Thompson. We will have to eat Gonzalez’ $21.5M.
Willing to trade Maeda, Hill, Ryu, & McCarthy, but good luck with that bunch.
We all can see what the Dbacks re-build has produced. It took a couple of years to gel, but they are a force now, and we don’t match up well. We need balance, not slump, slump, win big big, slump. Did anyone see the Warriors, Cavs, Spurs, and Houston slump last season? A good team is a good team all season. This team has shown me its colors the last 4 years. I was never a believer, was astounded at what happened this year, and now it’s finally apparent.
Part of the problem is that we are not playing the same players, that we played most of the time, before we got in this bad streak.
And part of that, was that Cody and Corey went out, one after another.
But when a team has three hitters in the line up, that are not even hitting 230 there will be a problem with moving runners over, and having a productive offense.
Corey just returned and Taylor should be in the lead off position tonight, so I would give our offense, a little longer to gel, since Corey just came back.
But Roberts having Granderson hitting at the top of the order, doesn’t help the team to have continuity in their offense, because he is a classic all or nothing hitter, so he strikes out way to much, to be hitting at the top of the order.
Granderson did single in the first inning, but more often then not, Granderson won’t get the job done, like when he struck out later in the game, when he wasn’t able to move Kike over to third, when there were no outs.
The Rockies were three for seven with runners in scoring position, and we were only one for eight, with runners in scoring position.
And that has been our problem, more often then not.
What happened in Darvish’s last inning, wasn’t all on him!
He did walk a hitter he shouldn’t have, but there was also poor defense, in the outfield.
Granderson bobbled a ball, and let a runner turn a single into a double, and Joc should have caught that fly ball, that most any centerfielder would have caught, pretty easily.
Joc has never had the speed of a true centerfielder, so he has to be almost perfect with his routes.
When Joc wasn’t able to catch that flyball, that allowed the Rockies to score two runs.
And Joc’s defense hasn’t been as good this year.
He looks really slow for a centerfielder, and quite a bit slower, then he was in his first year.
Dodgers Digests hinted about Joc’s weight gain, in some of their articles in spring training, and even people here, have made remarks about Joc ‘a weight gain, since the first year he came up, so I looked up what Joc weighed in 2015, to see just how much weight he has gained.
Joc weighed 185 in 2015, and he now weighs 225, that is a forty pound weigh gain, since his first season.
And Joc couldn’t afford to have much of any weight gain, because he lacks the speed most centerfielders have.
Anyways there was only one ball, that was hit really hard in that inning, so Darvish wasn’t as bad, as he looked, in his last inning.
We have to be better at doing the little things, like moving runners over into scoring position, and having productive outs, especially since our offense is struggling.
And Roberts needs to help the team, by making better line ups, and making sure, he has Taylor, Corey, Turner, and Cody at the top of the line up, like he did, when the team was winning.
And I know Turner had two chances, but he has been more good then bad, in those situations!
I disagree. I think that loss is all on Darvish.
Bluto
Your right it is Darvish’s fault, that Granderson can’t field a routine ball cleanly, and that Joc is not quick enough to cover the ground, that most centerfielders can.
Darvish’s one mistake, was walking Lucroy!
“What this has me questioning is why were we so good for so long? ”
The Apple Watch?
Artieboy
I would think it was, the Apple TV!
The Dodgers have a better record than Arizona, for what that’s worth.
What is it worth?
1. Avoid playing the ridiculous one game playoff
2. If we play AZ in the post season it means the final game of the series would be played at DS where, I believe, the home team has a slight advantage. Yes we lost game 5 vs the Mets at home, but I think the home team still has the historical advantage.
Other than that doesn’t mean much in this modern baseball post season system. Now if we were in the non WC system it would mean more, if we were in the ancient non division system it would mean everything and probably be much more excruciating to watch.
I was being facetious
Me too, in my weird, inane way 🙂
And the Dbacks have to probably play and beat the Rockies first, and who do they pitch, in that one game elimination?
A couple of things Jeff. First, it is just a losing streak. All teams go through them. If it continues and they lose the division it will officially be a meltdown. Darvish had one good game. His first one, since then he has been as mediocre as they come. In his defense, the Dodgers have made major adjustments to his mechanics. He has obviously not made them work past the 4th inning. For 4 innings he looked like the pitcher they traded for. Just 1 hit and 1 run, the Gonzo homer. The Dodgers scored 4 in the first so everyone had that feel good feeling to begin with. But lets look at the 5th inning. Amarista hits a single, he then walks Lucroy. A wild pitch gets them in scoring position. Tapia hits a flair to left center that neither Joc nor Granderson can catch. 2 runs in, Blackmon hits a ball that is misplayed for another double. LaMahieu hits a ball off the end of his bat that goes right down the line for another double and scores Blackmon. Then Arenado hits maybe the hardest hit ball of the inning and it is 5-4. Only then does Roberts pull Darvish. They had one visit to the mound during that sequence and that was a scouting report on Tapia. To put that in perspective, the Rockies took full advantage of their opportunities. The Dodgers had the tying run at third with 1 out, and could not get him home. Seager and Turner went down meekly. They even had two runners on with Rusin on the mound and Roberts stuck with his LH bats. Darvish is only part of the problem. Situational hitting is the major problem. But they pretty well knew when they traded for him that Darvish is a rental. As for Ethier, well this is the last year of his contract. He is a free agent at the end of the year. His Dodger career is pretty much toast. Gonzo is having back problems again and has stated that he will retire if it is so bad he cannot play. Forsythe will be bought out I am pretty sure. He has shown nothing that makes him valuable to the team. This FO will not do a major rebuild you can bet the house on that. Oh they will maybe trade some guys and non tender some. Ryu is on the last year of his deal so he will not be traded. Nobody is going to want McCarthy, he cannot stay healthy, same with Kazmir. Hill has two years left on his deal and at his age is almost untradeable, besides, FAZ loves the guy. Maeda may be the one guy in the bunch who has some value, and you are forgetting they have ANOTHER year of KAZ. They traded for Grandal for his framing skills, certainly not his clutch hitting skills of which he has none. He leads the league in passed balls. I keep Puig, but all the other outfielders are in play to be traded or released. Puig is having a down year vs LHP, but I think next spring he and Turner Ward will figure it out and he will have an even better season next year. Kike needs a new address. He is hitting at the Mendoza line the last two years and despite his versatility and ability to hit lefty’s, he is not all that reliable. The free agent market for pitchers this year is not that deep, but Arietta is one of them. And comparing a baseball season to basketball is silly. Basketball players play 81 games, they have multiple days off, and are constantly rotating players in and out of the lineup during a game. You cannot do that in baseball, the days off are limited. And in basketball, two great players in your lineup can mean championships with a decent supporting cast. Baseball is much more complicated.
Michael
They said Blackmon’s hit, was the hardest, and the only ball hit hard.
When those balls barely are fair, down the line, that is pitching with some tough luck.
And the ball Joc didn’t catch, was his, and on him, and even if it wasn’t, but it was, he is the centerfielder!
MJ, I am not disputing that the ball was his. What I am saying is that he had no chance in hell to catch it. When he dived for that ball it was a good 3 feet from his glove. It was a flair, and not hit all that hard. He should have not dived, and Granderson should have been in a better position to back him up. Point is if it was catchable he would have caught it. I watched the replay 4 times, and he had no chance. But what the hell Granderson was doing playing over Taylor is beyond me. The guy is old and slow.
Michael
Your right Joc couldn’t have caught that, but that is a ball, the most centerfielders, including Taylor, would have caught.
But you are right, he had no chance to catch it, so he just should have played it on the bounce, and maybe one less runner, would have scored.
But of course, I agree about, Granderson, and I rather see Verdugo in left, but I prefer Joc over Granderson too.
Also I read in the Times, that Barnes was going to catch more too.
I thought of you, when Nomar made a comment, about Grandal’s pass balls, on the broadcast,, when Nomar was last on.
Roberts line ups, haven’t been that helpful at all, too.
MJ, I disagree that Taylor would have caught that ball. He is RH. It was only as close as it was because Joc is LH. Taylor would have had to dive and backhand that ball. He is good as a CF, but not that good.
Chad Moriyama has an article on Dodgers Digest highlighting 6 actual issues for the Dodgers. Basically the same issues this community has been harping on for 2-3 weeks now. Glad the others are catching up.
I’m glad that we lost tonight. Truly. And this was the first game this year I thought it would be better to lose than win. Because of the stupid other blogs and sports writers tagging Seager’s return as some sort of event. There are no saviors for just plain sucking. They have been an embarrassment for at least two weeks now and now the rest of the Dodgers Nation is finally starting to admit it. The whole team has to pull together. There are no easy solutions for suck. If the FAZ think they know pressure, they ain’t seen nothing yet if we don’t make it to the WS this year.
Put a fork in them, they’re done.
True
Give this time, Corey just came back last night, and Cody has just started, getting his timing back!
And tonight, Tayor will be back in the lead off position, so we will have our top four together again!
And we are still ten games up, and our magic number, actually went down last night, became the Dbacks lost to the Padres.
Even the cool saber metric bloggers are using non saber metric terms like insanity, nightmare. Funny!
Remember Nietzche: “That which does not kill me, makes me stronger”.
Artieboy
I don’t know about Nietzsche, but his quote, sounds like what the Dodgers do to their fans, but once your in, your in, for life, good or bad!
That’s funny MJ!
YF
At this point, us fans, have to find a way to release our tension, so I am glad you thought that was funny!
I just hope they finally win tonight, because this is just on going disappointment, and we have enough disappointment in the post season, we don’t need anymore!