Rockies 6, Dodgers 5: And now that’s 9 losses in a row

With today’s 6-5 loss to the Rockies, the Dodgers have now dropped a comical nine games in a row and an almost inconceivable 14 of their last 15 games.

It’s … amazing?

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Alex Wood continued the struggles of the starting rotation today, surrendering five runs in five innings, and it’s gonna be hard for the Dodgers to turn things around when that was the best start for the team this series. Wood gave up eight hits and three walks (two intentional), but the concerning thing to me is just the two strikeouts.

His velocity has been a well-documented concern by now, and he was sitting in the 92-93 mph range and touching 94 mph for the first three innings, but as the game wore on he did sink back to 90-91 mph. It didn’t make much of a difference either way, however, as the elevated location was the issue today and most of the damage was done while the velocity was fine.

Not exactly encouraging from Wood, but not exactly encouraging from the whole team either.

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After Chad Bettis faced just the minimum through three, the offense broke out in the fourth, thanks in part to … Nolan Arenado? Yes, this whole month has been weird. Chris Taylor led-off the frame by advancing to second on an Arenado throwing error, then later scoring from third on a one-out Justin Turner single back up the box.

Cody Bellinger followed with a double to put men on second and third for Yasiel Puig, who promptly yanked a double of his own down the line in left that deflected of Arenado’s glove for two runs.

Then in the fifth, Andre Ethier pinch hit and turned back the clock, hitting a solo dong down the right-field line.

Unfortunately, as has been the theme during this streak, the Dodgers failed to capitalize in the fourth (2nd, 1 out & 1st/3rd, 2 outs), fifth (2nd, 1 out), and sixth (2nd, 2 outs). Terrible.

For the most part, the bullpen did their job, with Ross Stripling, Brandon Morrow, and Tony Watson combining for three scoreless innings, allowing just one hit (and one reaching on an error) and striking out four. However, Kenley Jansen ended up giving up a run in his inning on two doubles, one of which Joc Pederson had a play on the batter at second but made a poor throw and one of which CT3 got a terrible jump on in center. The box score shows just two errors, but it was a mess today defensively all game long. Just shoddy.

Still, the Dodgers definitely don’t have quit in them, and Logan Forsythe somehow smashed a homer in the ninth to cut the lead to one.

So they put up a fight, I suppose, but that’s just not enough at this point.

#Dodgers have lost 9 consecutive games for first time in 25 years, 9 consecutive home games for first time in 30 years.

— Bill Shaikin (@BillShaikin) September 10, 2017

92-50 overall now and 52-22 at home. Remember when they were on pace to win 116 games? Now they’re on pace to win 105. Fortunately, both the Diamondbacks and Nationals lost, so the lead in the NL West is still 10 games and the lead for the best record in baseball is still five games. The magic number is down to 11.

The Dodgers will try not to embarrass themselves further against the Rockies tomorrow afternoon at 10:10 AM HST/1:10 PM PST/4:10 PM EST. Rich Hill (3.67 ERA/3.91 FIP/4.69 DRA) will take the mound looking not to shit the bed like the rest of the rotation, and he’ll face off against Tyler Chatwood (4.88 ERA/5.10 FIP/4.53 DRA), who the Dodgers should be able to hit but probably won’t.