Hello,
Welcome to another installment of themusicaddict's Dodgers Daily for April 21st, 2013. The Dodgers-Orioles game was rained out Friday night. That lead to the Dodgers and Orioles playing a split double header yesterday. The Dodgers lost both and have now lost 6 games in a row.
Many of the Dodgers liabilities are being exposed early in this season. In Game 1 at least the Dodgers offense finally showed up, although they still lost 7-5. In the Dodgers previous 4 games they had scored a total of 7 runs. Although LA's offense showed up, their pitching wasn't great.
I just don't understand how a team that has about a $218 million payroll can have such terrible hitters at the bottom of their lineup. Since the game was in an AL Stadium, the Dodgers were able to use a designated hitter. This is what the 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th hitters line up did in Game 1. Ramon Hernandez was 0-3 and is hitting .111 on the season. Skip Schumaker was 0-3 and hitting .100 this season. Luis Cruz was 0-3 and is hitting .093 for this season. Justin Sellers at least had a hit, finishing 1-4. Sellers is comparatively hot to the other hitters as he's batting .186 this season. The final four batters in the Dodgers lineup were 1-13, which is a .076 batting average.
That especially doesn't help when one of the Dodgers best hitters is hitting so poorly this season, that of course is Matt Kemp. Kemp did have 3 hits in the first game, but that only raised his batting average to .217. He's only getting a hit roughly every fifth at bat and his bat hasn't had much pop this season. He still hasn't hit a home run and only has 5 RBIs this season. (All batting averages mentioned above were up to yesterday's Game 1.)
In Game 2 the Dodgers offense reverted to normal as they only scored 1 run. In 6 of the Dodgers last 8 games, their offense has managed more than 3 runs only two times. It seems that scoring at least 4 runs is the tipping point in order to win the majority of games. I tried to find exact stats on-line, but I didn't.
In Game 2 the Dodgers only managed 6 total hits and only one from that dreadful final four batters of the lineup. That final four included one of the Dodgers most highly paid players, Andre Ethier. He did hit a 3 run home run in Game 1. However in game 2 he was 0-4 and is hitting .250 this season. A.J. Ellis was 1-2 and is hitting .319 this season. Ellis is an unassuming key part of the Dodgers, although a consistent contributor. Although he only had one hit, he did get on base 3 times this game. Ellis's on-base percentage is .429 this season. Juan Uribe was 0-4 and is hitting .158 on the season. Luis Cruz was 0-3 as his batting average dropped to .087. And then in a pinch hitting role Skip Schumaker was 0-1 and has a .095 batting average this season. Although calling Schumaker a pinch hitter is a bit of a stretch, maybe they should just call him a pinch out? The Dodgers final 4 hitters hit .071 in Game 2. Their whole line up only hit .206.
Josh Beckett continues to be the anchor of the Dodgers staff, he dropped to 0-3 this season. He gave up 8 hits yesterday and has a 4.68 ERA. I hope the Red Sox thank LA everyday for taking Beckett off their hands.
Upcoming today is the final game in the Dodgers-Orioles series and this series can't end soon enough. The Orioles will send Jake Arrieta to the mound, he's 1-0 on the season. The Dodgers will send Stephen Fife to the mound, he's making his season debut for the Dodgers. No word on whether he's any relation to Barney Fife.
In Sunday's game Fife gave up 4 hits and 3 runs in the first inning. The Orioles only need to score one more run to almost guarantee themselves a victory as they are playing the offensively challenged Dodgers.
Not only is $147 million man Zack Greinke out for about 7 more weeks, now Chad Billingsley is going on the DL for the second time this season. He was placed on the 15 day DL because of his sore right elbow. It does look like Ted Lilly will be making his season debut for the Dodgers soon, but honestly I'm not expecting a whole lot from him.
Before Sunday's game the Dodgers are 7-10 and 4th place in the NL West. They trail the first place Rockies by 6 games. Even more concerning they only lead the last place Padres by 2 games. I don't have high hopes for this Dodgers team the rest of the season. Maybe they'll be able to dump some of their expensive players before the trade deadline and get some prospects. Sadly this current Dodgers team doesn't seem to be built to even make the playoffs.
Meanwhile the Orioles are 10-7 and third place in the AL East. They trail the surprising Red Sox by 2.5 games and the injury prone Yankees by a .5 game.
themusicaddict
No comments:
Post a Comment