Padres @ Dodgers August 11, 2020: Offense looks to bounce back against Richards

Following a disappointing offensive performance last night, the Dodgers look to rebound tonight against Garrett Richards and the Padres.

Richards faced the Dodgers last week, lasting five innings while allowing four runs on five hits and a walk in San Diego. Four of those hits went for extra-bases, with doubles by Justin Turner and Enrique Hernandez, a triple from Chris Taylor and a homer by Joc Pederson.

All four of those men are in the lineup again tonight, but Corey Seager is not again.

Roberts said Corey Seager (back) swung the bat, ran, and played catch yesterday. It’ll be a “slow progression.” The IL is still a possibility but they’ll stand pat for now.

— Jorge Castillo (@jorgecastillo) August 12, 2020

	6:40 p.m.		Los Angeles
SS	Tatis Jr.	LF	Pederson (L)
CF	Grisham (L)	RF	Betts
3B	Machado	1B	Bellinger (L)
DH	Pham	3B	Turner
1B	Hosmer (L)	CF	Pollock
RF	Myers	DH	Muncy (L)
2B	Cronenworth (L)	SS	Taylor
C	Hedges	2B	Hernandez
LF	Profar (S)	C	Barnes
P	Richards (R)	P	Stripling (R)

Meanwhile, Ross Stripling will face off against Richards as he did last week. His outing in San Diego went fine until Fernando Tatis Jr. connected on a two-run shot in the 5th. After a two-out, two-run double in the 6th, Stripling left the game after 5 2/3 innings allowing four runs on six hits and a pair of walks. He did strikeout seven and currently trails only Dustin May‘s 17 for the team lead.

Through his 18 innings on the mound so far this season, Stripling has thrown his four-seamer 49.3% of the time. That ranks 13th in MLB among pitchers with at least 250 pitches thrown according to Baseball Savant. His curve percentage, 24.4%, ranks 10th in MLB and his new changeup is at 17.4%.

Again, almost all sample sizes now and this season will be a little off, but those numbers are a bit different than any other time in his career. The four-seam usage previously peaked at 43.2% back in 2016, and the changeup is up from 14.7% a year ago.

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In other, non-Dodger news from earlier today…

The league has, as Marly suggested, given Alex Cintron a 20-game suspension. https://t.co/TFNB1B0m7S

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) August 11, 2020

Ramon Laureano’s suspension for charging the Astros’ dugout, as @susanslusser said, is for six games.

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) August 11, 2020

As sort of noted above, Joe Kelly‘s appeal hearing was yesterday, so we should get a final number on that to better compare with that above.