The Dodgers have thrown everything at their opponents for the past week than an offense and an effective bullpen. The results have been four straight losses to NL West opponents.
Tonight, In the second of three games against the Giants, the Dodgers threw lefty Alex Wood out to the mound, with the impossible task of winning the game all by himself.
Despite hitting a batter and giving up a couple of singles, which resulted in a Giants run in the second inning, Hill held his own against the Giants quite well. That was the only run he gave up, but the trouble was, he only lasted five innings.
Meanwhile, The Dodgers’ offense was doing absolutely nothing, and that one run looked like a monumental hill to climb.
JT Chargois and Caleb Ferguson combined for a scoreless 6th and 7th innings, and meanwhile the Dodgers continued to do nothing on offense.
And then the lid blew off! Yasiel Puig was batting in the 7th, when he fouled off a pitch. Puig said something to himself, and Giants catcher Hundley (still in his crouch) said something to Puig. Puig answered, Hundley rose and they continued jawing at each other.
Puig shoved once, then twice, and the benches cleared. Puig was red hot and was barely held back by Dodgers players and coaches. He got close enough to reach over someone’s shoulder and deliver a glancing slap to the catcher’s mask.
The scrum comtinued, Hundley was dragged to the ground, Puig pulled away, and when everything was settled, the former batter and catcher were both ejected.
Then in the 8th, with 2 out, Justin Turner banged out his third double of the night. Manny Machado, who hasn’t had a hit since the Reagan administration, stepped up with a big base hit to drive Turner home with the tying run.
Kenta Maeda came on in the ninth, and with two on, made a great play on a bunt to take out a runner headed to third base.
Again with two on, Maeda gave up a base hit to CF. Enrique Hernandez got the ball in and threw home – once again Yasmani Grandal could not hold on to the ball, and the go-ahead run scored. Kiké’s throw was a bit high and to the wrong side of the plate, so all the blame may not rest on Grandal this time. Regardless, the Dodgers were behind 2-1 with three outs left to change things.
Matt Kemp, at something like 2 for his last 57, flied out for the first out of the ninth. Grandal struck out on three pitches, and Max Muncy, the last hope for the boys, struck out on a pitch that was just to the right of the Dodgers dugout.
The Giants win 2-1 and look for the sweep against Hyun-Jin Ryu tomorrow.
Oscar Martinez
I was born in the shadow of Dodger Stadium and immediately drenched in Dodger Blue. Chavez Ravine is my baseball cathedral, Vin Scully was the golden voice of summer all my life, and Tommy Lasorda remains the greatest Dodgers manager ever. My favorite things are coffee, beer, and the Dodgers beating the Giants. I also blog about my baseball card hobby at All Trade Bait, All the Time.
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I’m waiting to hear how Roberts blew another one.
The early season sleepwalking offense has returned. Hard to watch.
Another left hander tonight. Teams would be wise to just keep running them out there. Obviously we have no answer.
I’m waiting to hear how Roberts blew another one.
The early season sleepwalking offense has returned. Hard to watch.
Another left hander tonight. Teams would be wise to just keep running them out there. Obviously we have no answer.
I’ve tried 3 different email addresses in here and because we have to fill out the email address with each post sometimes I mix them up and the post disappears. I just did it again so Scott, if you’re around, you can just dump the one your spam filter just grabbed.
No, Badger, I’m not going to call for Roberts’ firing anymore, simply because I now consider it a forgone conclusion. But it will be a “stealth” firing. They can’t just do a hostile firing, for fear he would talk too much and openly admit all the dumb decisions actually belonged to FAZ. Instead they will “promote” him to maybe Magic Johnson’s Special Baseball Advisor, whose duty is to read the blogs every day and let him know what the fans are saying… Or maybe he will resign because of his health or some other job offer, or something equally creative…
And don’t look for Joe Maddon as a replacement. He had the option to resign and come here at the same time FAZ did. And he declined. Maybe one term of playing Charlie McCarthy to F AZ’s Edger Bergen is enough for anyone….
No, Badger, I’m not going to call for Roberts’ firing anymore, simply because I now consider it a forgone conclusion. But it will be a “stealth” firing. They can’t just do a hostile firing, for fear he would talk too much and openly admit all the dumb decisions actually belonged to FAZ. Instead they will “promote” him to maybe Magic Johnson’s Special Baseball Advisor, whose duty is to read the blogs every day and let him know what the fans are saying… Or maybe he will resign because of his health or some other job offer, or something equally creative…
And don’t look for Joe Maddon as a replacement. He had the option to resign and come here at the same time FAZ did. And he declined. Maybe one term of playing Charlie McCarthy to F AZ’s Edger Bergen is enough for anyone….
I agree with Badger. Once again the futility of the offense is so very hard to watch. Turner was on 2nd 3 times and knocked in once? Pitiful. To Machado’s credit, he was stinging the ball which is a upgrade from all the strikeouts. And Kemp at least was not striking our also. He too crushed a pitch that went to the warning track, but not out in the heavy air. Taylor continues to strike out at a record pace for a player of his ilk. He has now struck out over 240 times in the last 2 seasons. Way too much. And he is missing pitches he was hitting last year. I think I am leaning towards bringing up not only Verdugo and Toles and maybe some DL time for Kemp, but also bringing up Donovan Solano who is hitting .369 at OKC. A SS who has a lot of MLB experience. Some sort of spark and different approach is needed. Suarez had a plus 7 ERA over his last few games and they made him look like Chris Sale. Pitching is doing it’s job. About time the offense got off of its butt.
I’m fine with inserting Verdugo into the lineup. But so many of our position players are asleep at the switch I don’t think one AAA player is going to make that much difference.
That Times article I posted yesterday suggested Roberts could be the fall guy if the team doesn’t snap out of it. Who knows. I can see them going on a run again. Machado looked locked in last night, just unlucky. Everyone else currently has warning track power, but, that could change too.
A team so inconsistent is difficult for me to follow. This losing streak, against teams we should be beating this time of year, is just tough to watch. Unfortunately, I believe this is who we are. Good for stretches, horrible for days, but we still watch because any day they could score in double figures. The Dodgers “Pythagorean” record is 70 – 51. Yeah, that’s what those pesky new algorithms say our record should be. Should. A word I’ve been advised to eliminate from my personal vocabulary. According to Pythagoras, the Dodgers “should” be 2 games up on the dbacks, and at least 10 games ahead of everyone else in the Division. Problem is, algorithms don’t play the game, players do. And the collection FAZ has put together, the collection on which Roberts pulls the strings, just can’t seem to perform at the level expected of them.
So, we wait. We wait for the 10 game win streak we know is in these guys. Maybe it begins tonight.
Badger
We wait until a pitcher has a bad day, or we face sub par pitching.
Because we look like World Beaters, against bad pitching, and all of the squirrels will hit solo HRs then too.
Little tidbit. OKC has almost the same won-loss record as the Dodgers. They lost a 1-0 heartbreaker last night. Solano had 2 hits and is hitting .362. Verdugo had two hits also. Farmer was 1-4 and caught the whole game, did not have an error or a passed ball….imagine that, a catcher who can play defense.
And like I already said, the Dodgers don’t see Farmer as a major league catcher.
It is quite obvious, how many innings has he caught at the major league level?
And the last time I looked, even with this his poor offense, Barnes has a positive war.
These front office wants all of these utility players to save money, and plug in players when they want.
But these utility players are not the same as a major league defensive player, at a position.
And why are the Dodgers looking to save money, with the prices they charge their fans, and being the second richest team, in all of baseball.
Toles had a day off last night.
Well I would pretty much question the Dodgers vision of anybody right now. Especially at the catching position. They have one who can’t hit and another who can’t catch. If Barnes was hitting what Grandal is hitting, he would be in there almost everyday. Grandal starts against a RHP and he is pretty good. Against lefty’s, not so much. Granted, him missing that throw from Kike was not all his fault because it was off line and high. But over the last few games, his passed balls and missed catches have cost the Dodgers runs and eventually the game. I know Toles did not play yesterday, that’s why I did not mention him. As for Farmer, I think they are really under rating the guy and he is a grinder. Something Grandal is not, and something Barnes has not shown this year. Neither of their top catching prospects are even close to being ready. Gale is doing well and has MLB experience. He is hitting in the .280’s at OKC. Although Smith and Ruiz are showing some power at AA, neither is hitting for a very good average, and yeah, I still value that stat. Smith in a short stint in AAA was not very good at all. They have shaken it up at other positions, why not catcher? As for saving money, well they want to re-set the luxury tax. We all know that, they are also being sued by some of their stock holders over misuse of funds and syphoning money from the trust to run the Dodgers, so who knows what kind of financial state they are in. Last time I went to a game, July 4th, my sister, who bought the tickets before I even got home, forked out over 340.00 for 5 seats and premium parking, which goes to McButthole, and was 40 bucks all by itself. Not counting what we spent on refreshments, it was well over 400.00 and that’s ridiculous. By contrast, we went to a Rancho Cucamonga Quakes game, sat in box seats right behind the screen in the second row and those seats were 13.00 apiece, and no parking fee since my sister has a disability. Total cost was about 75.00. Big difference. I remember sitting in the Pavilion in left field almost every time I went to a game and paying 3.00 a ticket and 2.50 for parking. They are pricing the common fan right out of the game. Oh and last night they gave away a Rich Hill bobble head, making this a premium game, and they charge more for those…….go figure.
They are filling the stadium again this year. It doesn’t matter what they charge, they get it. And yes, this is a reset year saving the team untold millions in tax money starting this year. That makes team finances look that much better for potential buyers down the road. One of my advisors tells me this ownership will be out in two years.
I don’t believe they intend to replace those players who won 104 and came up one hairball from a championship. Those players do not currently look like the same players they were last year, and yes, a couple key pieces of last year’s team is gone or on I.V. (injury vacation) but I get the impression Taylor, Barnes, Kemp, Bellinger, Dozier, Hernandez and Grandal will continue to be given opportunities to fail…. er, I mean succeed. These are FAZ starters. They’ll come around. Eventually. Maybe.
That said, a trip to the I.V. for Taylor, Hernandez or Kemp while Verdugo plays would be fine with me. Can Verdugo hit lefties?
But in reality it is not the same team. Oh yeah, the core is there, but there are some notable people missing. Not the least of which is Morrow. I also think they really miss Andre’s leadership in the dugout, and for sure they are missing Corey’s bat. So, there have been changes. The bullpen especially. They still dumpster dive way too much.
Michael
I agree with you about that, but having him only catch 9 innings at the major league level, does say what they think about Farmer, as a catcher.
He has played over a hundred innings, at third though.
He has caught a lot more innings than that in AAA. His versatility is a plus. It is all about opportunity, I think his lack of innings and the fact that last year by the time he was called up they had a lock on the division title has more to do with it than what they think of him as a catcher. He has caught 29 games down there this year, but they have used 4 different guys at catcher including Gale, Smith and Brockmeyer. When he was with the team earlier this year, all those starts at 3rd were because Turner was on the Dl, and Barnes and Grandal were there to catch. He caught 11 games in spring training and had improved his defensive metrics and that was commented on a lot by the broadcast team. But his value is like Kike, he is versatile and can play 1st base and third along with catching. But I like his bat…he is a better hitter than Barnes or Grandal, just not Grandal type power.
I thought it was pathetic when Orel had to bring up the exit velocity of some of the balls, Manny hit.
I didn’t check exit velocity numbers on the other players, but I did check Manny’s, exit velocities.
But a lot of players hit a ball hard, into a shifts.
But this is not all on Manny, this is on the whole team, and the things the front office values.
The front office is the ones that made up this roster, and they are the ones that emphasize HRs, instead of having hitters, change their approach, when runners are on base, or in scoring position.
Line drives have been hit in this game in three different centuries. I saw Frank Howard hit one down the line into the upper deck at Dodger Stadium that was gone in 3 seconds. Looked like a Koepke 3 iron shot. It hit empty seats and sounded like a grenade had gone off. Nobody talked exit velocity that day. Nobody had to. That ball was smoked. Orel sometimes just opens his mouth and has no real idea what he’s saying but tries to make it sound like he’s an expert. I really thought he would be better at this than he is.
In the 63 series, Howard hit a ball off of Whitey Ford that went into the loge deck right down the left field line, and he hit it one handed. It was out of there like a shot from a gun. Ford was stunned and just stared at where the ball landed. I also saw Frank hit a ball into the left field pavilion that shattered the boards that they used to call back rests out there before they made them look like seats. They were nothing more than benches. I would like to know what the exit velocity on that shot was….All these new stats and stuff are there for those who give a damn about that stuff. All I care is did the damn thing fall in or not. Orel is about as exciting to listen to as a gold match, and they are totally off the charts BORING.
Badger
I agree with you about line drives, like you said, many line drives are hit out of a stadiums.
Manny did hit every ball hard last night, but when Orel said that, even before Manny hit in Turner, it sounded to me, as desperation.
We just really miss Corey’s bat in this line up, and we missed Turner, before he started hitting.
And we know some players that had career years last year, were not going to do the same, this year.
We just have to many of the same type of hitters, in this line up.
And this team’s biggest problem is not getting on base, it is getting the runners home.
Offense? They’ve only hit .235/.317/.417/.734 since the All-Star Break. Relievers 6.63 ERA and a handful of BS’s in August. This current schneid is a team effort. Kemp has been awful. Muncy, Hernandez, Taylor, Bellinger,Grandal….. only Turner is hitting. I expect it will get better.
Badger
Kike has been the worse hitter in all of baseball against lefties, since June 29.
He was 4 for 44 against lefties during this time, before these last two games.
But I don’t think he has done much, in these last two games, either.
But your right, Turner is the only one hitting, but Cody has hit more then most, but I don’t know how long Cody has been hitting.
But this team is so hard to watch, when they get this bad on offense.
We can always count on our squirrels to get hot, at the same time!
Badger
All those things you outlined are true but let us not forget the crappy job Dummy has done.
Package
Glad to see a post from you Package, I have been thinking about you, because I haven’t seen a post, from you lately.
MJ
Sorry I have been a little busy but am following you all. Maybe we will get a win soon.