Hello,
In the third game of the 4 game series between the Dodgers and Angels, the Angels prevailed 4-3. With LA's inept offense, the Dodgers need amazing pitching nearly every game to compete for the playoffs. When either Clayton Kershaw or Hyun-Jin Ryu aren't pitching the Dodgers are really in trouble. I'm still not sold on Zac Greinke. He's struggled since coming back to the Dodgers from his stupid fight. (It doesn't look like Greinke will pitch against the Padres in their upcoming series, that's probably a good thing.)
Chris Capuano gave his all against the Angels. But he's either not ready to be a top flight major league pitcher or never will be. In 5.2 innings, he gave up 6 hits, 3 runs and 4 hits. All 3 runs were earned. He also valiantly pitched out of a bases loaded jam in the first inning. Capuano is now 1-4 and has a 5.45 ERA.
But with the Dodgers having the second to worse run scoring team in all of MLB, 3 runs many times will be the their max in a game. The Dodgers continue to score runs at an alarmingly low rate. They're only ahead of the terrible Miami Marlins, a team that I believe has lost 18 of their last 21 games. That shows you how bad the Marlins are. Basically the Dodgers are Kershaw and Ryu away from being the Marlins.
Since I don't have a lot of time to work on this blog today the following numbers aren't 100% correct. But the number are accurate enough for you to see the picture of how anemic LA's offense has been this season. The Dodgers have played 51 games this season, they've scored 3 runs or less in 33 of those games. Two-thirds of the time once an opponent scores 4 runs they'll win the game. The Dodgers have scored 4 runs or less 37 times. It's only been 14 times the Dodgers have scored more than 4 runs.
The Dodgers have scored 178 runs this season, 3.49 runs per game, which places them in 29th place. With how bad the Marlins are this year the Dodgers probably won't slip to last place. But the Chicago White Sox better watch out, they've only scored 2 more runs than the Dodgers this season. The White Sox scored a total of 3 runs against the Cubs on Thursday. If LA "explodes" for 5 runs today, they'll be tied with the White Sox for #28 in runs scored for MLB. Oh boy, let the good times roll. Owners and management of the Dodgers were probably expecting a bit more when they agreed to $216 million in contracts for this season.
One reason the Dodgers score so few runs is because they hit so few home runs, especially with people on base. The Dodgers are 28th in MLB in home runs, they have 36. Surprisingly the Dodgers had two home runs last night, that's a home run explosion for them. (Dioneer Navarro, Ryan Zimmerman and Chris Davis all had at least 2 home runs by themselves last night.) Par for the course with the Dodgers, both homers were solo shots. But I'm so glad to see both Adrian Gonzalez and Scott Van Slyke hitting home runs last night. Gonzalez is hitting .333 with 7 home runs, while Van Slyke is hitting .290 with 4 home runs. However Van Slyke has only been up with the Dodgers about a month now.
Thankfully Hanley Ramirez should be back in about 2 weeks.
Two of the big money Dodgers continue to struggle. Matt Kemp was 0-3 and is now hitting .251 this season. Kemp is scheduled to undergo a MRI on Thursday on his right hamstring. The Dodgers may put him on the 15 Day DL. Honestly I hope this doesn't sound too rude, but a potential replacement couldn't do much worse. The Dodgers have Yasiel Puig, who tore up spring training. Along with Puig in Chattanooga is Zac Pederson. This season is lost, what do the Dodgers have to lose to bring up both of these players now? I think it's time for the Dodgers to give a look at the two Lookouts. LA needs to build for the future as all these high priced veterans start their inevitable decline.
Kemp's doing even worse than Andre Ethier, who was 1-4 and is now hitting .253. I'd rather see either Puig or Pederson play in place of Ethier. At worse either young player could bring some excitement to the Dodgers lineup. Both players have 8 home runs playing for Chattanooga. (Thanks to Mark Saxon at ESPN LA.)
The Dodgers dropped to 22-29 and are firmly in last place in the NL West, they trail the first place Dbacks by 7.5 games. LA now has a 3.3% chance of making the playoffs.
Tonight's pitching matchup will be Ted Lilly (0-1, 5.63 ERA) vs. Jason Vargas (4-3, 3.43) in the fourth and final game in the Dodgers-Angels series. Even though today is getaway day, tonight's game doesn't start until 7:05 PCT. The Dodgers start a 3 game series in Colorado tomorrow. No rest for the weary, including tonight's game the Dodgers have games scheduled for the next 14 days.
One of the teams I follow is the Orioles and I want to give a shout out to Chris Davis. Yesterday in the Orioles 9-6 victory over the Nationals, Davis was 4-4 and hit two homers. Davis has 19 homers, which is first in MLB. Davis leads the Tigers amazing Miguel Cabrera by 4 homers. Davis also has 50 RBIs, which is second in MLB. He trails Cabrera by 9 RBIs. Davis is third in MLB batting average, he's hitting 3.59. He trails Jean Segura, who's hitting .360. He also trails Cabrera (there's that name again), who's hitting .368.
If I remember right a player winning back to back triple crowns has only happened twice, will this year be the third time? Quite simply Cabrera is a hitting machine and it will be fun to follow him throughout the rest of the season. Of course there's a chance that Chris Davis can win the triple crown as well.
themusicaddict
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