Dodgers Daily, June 7th, 2013: Puig Does It Again As Dodgers Offense Remains Pathetic

Hello,

The Dodgers are now 4-1 on their 10 game home stand following a I'm glad I didn't have to sit through it 2-1 victory over the Braves. Even with Yasiel Puig the Dodgers offense is pathetic, but what would their offense be without him? In the 5 games he's played with the Dodgers, he's counted for over half of their RBIs. Puig is carrying the offensively inept Dodgers on his back. Puig was responsible for half of the Dodgers runs yesterday with his solo homer, his 4th home run in 5 career games.

Puig is now tied for 4th place on the Dodgers in terms of homers. In RBIs he's tied for 9th place. If he keeps driving in runs like this he'll quickly move up the Dodgers list. Adrian Gonzalez leads the Dodgers with 43 RBIs, the next highest Dodgers in RBIs is Matt Kemp. He has 17 RBIs and obviously he's on the DL now. If Puig has 5 more RBIs, and if everything else remains even, Puig would have 15 RBIs and be tied for third place in that stat for the Dodgers.

The Dodgers went on to win in extra innings as Skip Schumaker was able to score on Braves pitcher Anthony Varvarro's wild pitch. That's right the Dodgers were able to win the game because of a wild pitch. A win is a win, but how pathetic is winning that way? And if it wasn't for the wild pitch, Puig was the next hitter up for the Dodgers.

Hyun Jin-Ryu, the man who seems to be headed to being the ace of the Dodgers pitching staff, had another excellent game. He pitched 7.2 innings and gave up 6 hits, but only 1 run. He also had 6 strikeouts and lowered his ERA to 2.72.

The Dodgers remain in last place in the NL West, 1/2 game behind 4th place San Diego. They trail first place Arizona by 7.5 games. According to ESPN the Dodgers now have a 4.8% chance of making the playoffs.

Yesterday I had hopes that the Dodgers would rise all the way to 25th place in terms of runs scored, I now realize those hopes are in vain. This team just can't hit well enough or score runs in large batches for longer than a game. The 27th scoring team, LA, in the MLB trails the team ahead of them by 7 runs. That team is the Pirates, who've been struggling to score of late as well. After being swept by the Braves and having a day off the Pirates scored all of 2 runs yesterday. They were saved with a brilliant pitching performance by Nelson Liriano (4-2, 1.75 ERA)

Today's Dodgers-Braves scheduled pitching matchup is Stephen Fife (1-0, 4.50 ERA). The goggled one had a decent performance in his last start on June 3rd. Pitching for the Braves is hard luck starter Kris Medlen. After having a magical run the last half of last season, he's struggled mightily this season. Medlen is 2-6, but has a solid ERA of 3.14.

One final note, the Oakland A's remain on their extremely hot streak. Since May 17th, Oakland is 18-3.  Following the games on May 17th, 2013 the A's were 21-22 and trailed first place and 27-15 Texas by 6.5 games. Following last night's games the A's now lead the Rangers by .5 games. Oakland has a 68.5% chance of making the playoffs, this would be their second consecutive season qualifying for the playoffs. Just for contrast's sake Oakland is 6th place in MLB in runs scored. Will Billy Beane be in the running for another Executive Of The Year?

Although I love the big market, high salary Dodgers I will always cheer for the small market teams as well. I'd love to see what kind of impact the relatively small salaried A's would have if they won the World Series.

themusicaddict