Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers are on a 100-loss pace after last night’s embarrassing defeat. The funny things is, they’re playing against a team that is actually trying to be lose 100 games in the Marlins.
|
Dodgers
|
Marlins
|
|||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
9:10 AM
|
Miami
|
|||
|
SS
|
Taylor |
3B
|
Prado | |
|
C
|
Barnes |
2B
|
Castro | |
|
3B
|
Turner |
1B
|
Bour | |
|
LF
|
Kemp |
RF
|
Anderson | |
|
CF
|
Hernandez |
LF
|
Dietrich | |
|
1B
|
Bellinger |
SS
|
Rojas | |
|
2B
|
Forsythe | CF | Brinson | |
|
RF
|
Puig |
C
|
Holaday | |
|
P
|
Maeda (R)
|
P
|
Smith (L)
|
With the Dodgers struggling, one would have thought the Dodgers could at least get right against the likes of the Reds and Marlins. They did win 104 games last season, after all. Instead, they got swept by Cincinnati and are on the verge of being swept by the Marlins.
The Dodgers' loss to the Marlins puts them 10 games under .500 (16-26) through 42 games.
According to @EliasSports, that is tied for the fastest a team has gone 10 games under .500 after winning 100+ games the year before.
They tied the 1986 Cardinals, who finished 79-82
— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) May 17, 2018
Baseball sucks. Life is pain. Et cetera.
But for all the twisting these stat agencies do to come up with bits of information that are generally useless, this is still disappointing. The Dodgers have been hit with injuries, but my God, they aren’t a .381 true talent team. It’s infuriating to watch this team. You can be good and boring. You can be good and exciting. You can even be bad and exciting. But you can’t be bad and boring, and that’s what the Dodgers are right now.
——
Caleb Smith was supposed to start last night, but he was pushed back to this morning. He has been the Marlins’ best starter this season. He has a 3.23 FIP and a 31.9 K% in 39 2/3 innings. He’s a fastball-slider-changeup guy, with his slider being his best pitch. The left-hander will face a mostly right-handed lineup this morning.
Chris Taylor moves back into the leadoff spot against a lefty, with Austin Barnes and his .401 OBP batting second. Matt Kemp is also back after a night off, but he has been struggling of late. Since collecting three hits against the Diamondbacks on May 8, he’s just 2-for-23 with two walks and six strikeouts. Despite the slump, he’s still the second-most productive hitter on the team (128 wRC+). What a world we live in.
Kenta Maeda will do his best to keep the mighty Marlins at bay. He has given up four or more runs in four of his last five starts. He’s still missing plenty of bats (26.2 K%), but he has also given up four home runs in 27 1/3 innings. Ironically, his lone good game (6 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 7 K) of this recent stretch came against the Marlins, so there’s that.
——
If the Dodgers get swept by the Marlins, well, they might very well be done. Read me at True Blue LA tomorrow with my take on that. These are not good times, folks. And with the Dodgers staring down a weekend that includes facing Max Scherzer and Stephen Strasburg, well, it’d be nice if they got a win on getaway day.
