Hello,
With Zack "Rocky"Greinke back in the Dodgers starting rotation, the Dodgers beat the Washington Nationals 3-1 in the final game of their 3 game series. This is the Dodgers 4th win in their last 5 games. Greinke had a decent game, giving up 5 hits but only 1 run in 5.1 innings. Greinke improves to 2-0 and lowered his ERA to 1.62. That is a sensational ERA, will be be able to maintain that for the rest of the season? Greinke showed why LA paid him $147 million to play for the Dodgers. Physically he's a great pitcher, hopefully he'll be more intelligent going forward. In other words, NO MORE FIGHTS! Zack, you are paid too much to miss games because of your poor decisions.
In the title of this blog I asked whether the Dodgers winning 4 of 5 games matters? I'm glad LA won 80% of their last 5 games, but their offense remains anemic. The Dodgers are 29th of 30 teams in runs scored. Hell they've scored 31 runs fewer than even the Astros, which basically is a Triple A franchise. With the Dodgers current roster, I don't see much hope for them scoring more runs. LA Dodgers won 2 of their last 3 games, although only scoring 7 runs. That's a sign of how dominant Clayton Kershaw and Greinke can be. In those same 3 games Washington also scored 7 runs, they just happened to score 6 in their lone victory. Washington so far is one of the biggest disappointment in MLB, probably only second to Toronto.
The Dodgers are still in last place in the NL West and still are 5.5 games behind 23-17 first place San Francisco. Their playoff chances increased to 7.2%, which is lower than the terrible Cubs and Padres. Being worst than the Cubs in anything is very embarrassing for a team that has an approximately $216 million payroll.
LA has Thursday off, before opening a 3 game series with the Braves in Atlanta. The Braves are 22-18 and first place in the NL East, they lead second place Washington by 1 game. The three pitchers that are scheduled to pitch for the Dodgers in this series are Hyun-Jin Ryu (4-2, 3.40 ERA), Chris Capuano (1-2, 6.60 ERA) and Matt Magill (0-0, 6.92). Obviously based on the Dodgers starting pitchers, the Dodgers best chance to win is Friday's game.
The Dodgers starting pitching merry go around continues. Greinke coming back is fantastic and timely news. Joining Ted Lilly and Chad Billingsley on the DL was Josh Beckett- although of those pitchers Billingsley is the only one that I consider a true loss. Beckett originally had been scheduled to pitch Sunday, I'm glad Magill is getting the start instead. He might actually have a future with the Dodgers. I expect Beckett to last as long as Amar'e Stoudemire will with the Knicks once their seasons are over. The Dodgers also signed Jonathan Sanchez, which shows how desperate they are for starting pitching. Sanchez was brutal for the Pirates, 0-3 with an 11.85 ERA, in April.
Speaking of Dodgers pitchers, I wish the Dodgers will go to Kenley Jansen as the closer. I know that Brandon League is getting paid almost 11 times more but I'd prefer Jansen to be the closer still. And as with the entire Dodgers roster the pay to a player and their actual performance has very little correlation.
themusicaddict
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