Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
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Dodgers
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Padres
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6:05 p.m. PT
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San Diego
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2B
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Utley
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CF
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Jay
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SS
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Seager
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2B
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Spangenberg
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3B
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Turner
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RF
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Kemp
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1B
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Gonzalez
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1B
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Myers
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RF
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Puig
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3B
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Solarte
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LF
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Crawford
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C
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Norris
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CF
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Pederson
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SS
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Ramirez
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C
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Ellis
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LF
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Blash
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P
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Maeda (R)
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P
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Cashner (R)
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Tonight’s finale against the Padres will contain one of the most anticipated Dodger pitching debuts in quite some time. Kenta Maeda will toe the rubber in an MLB game for the first time, facing off against Andrew Cashner. Maeda dazzled in spring, and faces a lineup which has just been dreadful. The Dodgers are the first team in the box score era (1913 to present) to start a season with starts of 6IP+, 1 hit or fewer, and zero runs allowed. They’re also the first team to do it with two hits or less, magnifying their brilliance. Maeda probably won’t do that, but he doesn’t have to. While the biggest test for him will be getting into an every-five-day rhythm, it’ll be nice to watch him face a major league lineup, a moment which has looked somewhere between possible and inevitable for about five years.
As one would expect, tonight’s game is being broadcast on NHK, Japan’s national broadcasting network. Takashi Saito, who is now an intern (?) for the Padres, will be on the microphone for the call. Some US cable packages carry the channel, so it may be an option for those of you without access to SNLA.
On the injury front, news has not really changed since yesterday. Yasmani Grandal, Howie Kendrick, and Hyun-jin Ryu will all be in simulated games tomorrow, and Grandal is still on track to return next week.
Since there isn’t really another place for this and it’s as good a time as any, there is some news on the English-speaking NPB fan front. First, the incredible Yakyubaka, which supplied English news about Japanese baseball for years, has shut down. However, YakyuDB has taken its place, which has a better design and additional features. Additionally, a few members of NPB twitter (Yakyu Night Owl, Kazuto Yamazaki, Steve Novosel) have banded together to form a site called The Ouendan, which provides English recaps and summaries for the Pacific League. Even though Maeda pitched in the Central League, it’s as relevant as these plugs for sites I read frequently will get.
