Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
You know me, and you know I never like to put undue importance on any one game. It’s a long season. It serves no purpose to get overly emotional about .006 of a season, which is all one game really is.
|
Dodgers
|
Giants
|
|||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
6:05 p.m.
|
San Francisco, Ca.
|
|||
|
2B
|
Gordon
|
CF
|
Pagan
|
|
|
RF
|
Puig
|
2B
|
Panik
|
|
|
1B
|
Gonzalez
|
C
|
Posey
|
|
|
RF
|
Kemp
|
3B
|
Sandoval
|
|
|
SS
|
Ramirez
|
RF
|
Pence
|
|
|
LF
|
Crawford
|
LF
|
Blanco
|
|
|
3B
|
Uribe
|
1B
|
Ishikiwa
|
|
|
C
|
Ellis
|
SS
|
Crawford
|
|
|
P
|
Greinke (R)
|
P
|
Hudson (R)
|
I still believe that. Tonight’s game, no matter what the outcome, won’t “make or break” the season. It can’t. The Dodgers still have 14 games after this one, and four of those will come against the Giants. Even if they lose this one, they still would be tied for first place, tied — depending on what Washington does, if they even play in rainy New York — for the most wins in the National League.
That said: The Dodgers have held or tied first place in the NL West every day since July 26, and now they’re just one game up on the surging Giants. After the egg Hyun-jin Ryu dropped last night — understandably, I guess, since he was not healthy — you can understand that there’s added pressure on Zack Greinke to pitch well, and for the bats (with Dee Gordon and Carl Crawford back in the lineup) to hit better against Tim Hudson than they did against Madison Bumgarner. It’s not a “must win,” because it’s a regular season game on Sept. 13, but if you’re feeling that there’s only so many games left in the season and that a game against the only real competitor the Dodgers have takes on added importance, I wouldn’t fault you for that.
In news: Paco Rodriguez has been activated, giving the Dodgers a third lefty in the bullpen alongside J.P. Howell and Scott Elbert, and the 78th player on the active roster. (Probably. It feels like it.) Ryu is “doubtful” for his next start in Colorado, as expected, and Carlos Frias is likely to make the start in his place. That sounds terrifying.
Anyway, if the Dodgers don’t take this one, they’ll head into tomorrow’s game needing to win to avoid a sweep. Even that wouldn’t end the season, of course, but it might for me, because the amount of fans I’d need to deal with freaking out over it might push me over the edge. So… goooo Dodgers?
[table id=5 /]