Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers were in control for most of last night’s game, as Landon Knack continued to look like a solid rotation piece and Shohei Ohtani and Gavin Lux provided the offense. Things got a bit tense in the ninth as Alex Vesia struggled to close out a four-run lead and left the bases loaded for Evan Phillips, who got the final out for a fifth-consecutive Dodger victory. The Dodgers also get some reinforcements back for the final two games against the Giants, as Clayton Kershaw returns tomorrow and Tyler Glasnow comes off the IL for tonight’s game.
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| 7:10 P.M. | Los Angeles | ||
| DH | Soler | DH | Ohtani (L) |
| 1B | Wade Jr. (L) | C | Smith |
| CF | Ramos | 1B | Freeman (L) |
| 3B | Chapman | RF | T. Hernández |
| LF | Conforto (L) | CF | Pages |
| SS | Fitzgerald | LF | Vargas |
| RF | Yastrzemski (L) | 2B | Taylor |
| C | Casali | 3B | K. Hernández |
| 2B | Wisely (L) | SS | Ahmed |
| P | Ray (L) | P | Glasnow (R) |
Glasnow hit the IL on July 9 with some back tightness, but was fine enough to travel to the All-Star game last week. With the break, he essentially only missed one start with his last start coming on July 5. He struggled quite a bit in his final two starts, where he allowed five earned runs in back-to-back outings after doing so only twice in his other 16 starts. The Dodgers ended up winning both of those games (tbt Glasnow getting like no run support for a month), but his ERA jumped from 2.88 to 3.47 in only nine innings over those two starts. Glasnow still leads the Dodgers with 109 1/3 innings pitched this season (and in 18 starts, which matches Gavin Stone and the recently-DFA’d James Paxton for the most as well). Assuming he doesn’t have any implosion starts, Glasnow should top the 120-inning career high he set last season in Tampa in the next week or so (though he also threw 13 1/3 innings in the Minors and five innings in the playoffs last season). Hopefully the IL stint bought Glasnow a bit of a break as the Dodgers look to the final months of the season and to October, where Glasnow is a big part of the formula for success.
While Glasnow missed a couple weeks, the Giants start a familiar face that hasn’t pitched since March 31, 2023. Robbie Ray makes his return from Tommy John and his Giant debut tonight. Ray was shut down after his first start last year with the Mariners, and that injury was later revealed to require Tommy John. He’d been one of the more durable pitchers in baseball before that injury, topping 120 innings in six of his eight pre-injury seasons (the two others being his rookie year and the Covid year). He won the Cy Young in 2021 and led the AL with 193 1/3 innings and a 2.84 ERA for Toronto before signing with the Mariners, who got a solid season out of him in 2022 before his injury in 2023. Ray posted a 3.71 ERA in 189 innings in 2022 and he made 32 starts for the second consecutive year. They moved him to San Francisco in January, and Ray will make his first big league start for the Giants tonight. Ray pitched in 10 rehab games since early June and allowed 11 runs and 19 hits over 29 1/3 innings while striking out 45 batters. His last two starts were great, as he combined to allow two hits over 10 1/3 shutout innings and struck out 16. He topped out at 78 pitches in his last outing.
The former Diamondback has faced the Dodgers 21 times in his career, more than any other team. He has a 3.39 ERA in his career against the Dodgers and has allowed a .685 OPS. That OPS drops down to .550 in his 10 career starts at Dodger Stadium, where he has a 2.21 ERA and has struck out 91 batters in only 61 innings. All of those starts came prior to 2020, so take that with a grain of salt. In 2022, Ray threw a four-seamer 39.3 percent of the time, slider 37.2 percent of the time and a sinker 20.2 percent of the time. He mixed in a knuckle-curve (1.9 percent after using it over 16 percent of the time from 2017-2021) and a change 0.7 percent of the time.
A surprise at the bottom of the Dodger lineup today, as Nick Ahmed was signed and starts at short.
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Ahmed takes the place of Miguel Rojas on the active roster and Ricky Vanasco on the 40-man.
Nick Ahmed is at Dodger Stadium. The Dodgers have signed him, a source said.
— Fabian Ardaya (@FabianArdaya) July 24, 2024
Miguel Rojas to the IL.
Dodgers are designating reliever Ricky Vanasco for assignment, sources tell The Athletic.
— Fabian Ardaya (@FabianArdaya) July 24, 2024
Clears a 40-man roster spot for Clayton Kershaw, who returns off the 60-day IL tomorrow.
The Vanasco move came earlier in the day and most thought it was clearing the 40-man spot for Kershaw to come off the 60-day IL tomorrow. Instead, Ahmed gets the roster spot as Rojas was placed on the IL with a flexor strain. There’s no timetable for his return, but Ahmed is expected to carry the bulk at short until he or Mookie Betts returns. Ahmed was released by the Giants a couple weeks ago after posting a .238/.278/.303 triple slash in 52 games for them this season. He provides the Dodgers a good defensive shortstop to fill in while Rojas is out, and provides a lot of humor potential in the next two days if he goes off against the Giants.
In other roster move news, Knack was optioned to make room for Glasnow.
#Dodgers activated RHP Tyler Glasnow, signed and activated infielder Nick Ahmed, optioned RHP Landon Knack and placed infielder Miguel Rojas on the IL with right forearm tightness, retroactive July 22. In order to make room on the 40-man roster, RHP Ricky Vanasco was DFA’d.
— Kirsten Watson (@kirsten_watson) July 24, 2024
Knack put together a strong start last night and will almost definitely help the Dodgers down the stretch. Whether that be by him pitching in LA down the stretch or as a trade piece, Knack did show some promise in his nine outings in the bigs.
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There seems to be an unfortunate solution for Kershaw’s roster move, as it’ll be a while until we see Kyle Hurt again.
Kyle Hurt’s season is over and 2025 is in jeopardy as the right-hander is set to undergo Tommy John surgery, source says. First reported by @DodgersNation. Expected to be a standard TJ procedure rather than a hybrid.
— Fabian Ardaya (@FabianArdaya) July 24, 2024
The aptly-named Hurt will undergo Tommy John and be sidelined potentially through next season. I can’t exactly tell if he is or isn’t currently on the 60-day IL, but the MLB.com roster doesn’t say he is so I’m trusting that. He’s scheduled to undergo the surgery on July 30 and likely won’t be seen until 2026.
In good injury news, Walker Buehler is set to begin his rehab assignment.
Walker Buehler is starting for Triple-A Oklahoma City on Friday. #Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said he’ll go through two starts down there and the hope is he’s ready to return after that.
— Juan Toribio (@juanctoribio) July 25, 2024
Buehler will start for OKC on Friday and the hope is he’ll only need two rehab starts before returning to the bigs.
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In t-shirt news, buy this Teoscar Hernandez shirt.
Teoscar Hernandez is good. This shirt is good. You should consider purchasing it. Or not, no worries. https://t.co/7AD98qU1vG pic.twitter.com/iDn8H0CYMP
— Dustin Nosler (@DustinNosler) July 24, 2024
Dustin with the hard sell there. My #sources have told me if you, loyal reader, don’t buy this shirt, the Dodgers won’t extend Hernandez and will instead move to Vegas instead of the A’s. You’ve been warned.
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First pitch is scheduled for 7:10 PM PT and will be shown on SportsNet LA.
