Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers fell to the Red Sox tonight at home, 9-0, as the offense was rendered completely useless by the knuckler of Steven Wright and the pitching staff had another stinker (the defense helped). The Dodgers are now 1-3 in the post-Yasiel Puig era and 9-9 after the All-Star break.
Not great.
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Scott Kazmir had one of those starts again, having zero command and just overall looking like absolute shit. He still lasted 5.1 innings because batters were so eager to swing against him, and he gave up four runs on five hits and four walks. More than the walks, though, Kazmir would constantly get behind hitters in the count and was unable to put them away when he did get to two strikes (two strikeouts). The damage could’ve been a lot worse, but Josh Fields relieved him and immediately induced a double play to get out of the sixth.
Unfortunately for the Dodgers, but much to my amusement, Jesse Chavez brought the gas can usually reserved for Chris Hatcher, giving up five runs on four hits and a walk in his 1.1 innings of work. That means the new acquisition is now sitting on a cool ERA of 27.00, and literally the only upside to it is that they’ve come in blowout games anyway.
J.P. Howell got two outs without giving up a run, and then Luis Avilan came in to mercifully finish the Dodgers pitching portion of the game with a scoreless frame.
The offense managed just three hits (one double) and a walk all night against the knuckler of Wright.
https://twitter.com/ChadMoriyama/status/761771052020011008
At times he got help from a generous strike zone…
https://twitter.com/ChadMoriyama/status/761778234316894208
…but in general it didn’t really matter.
There were no highlights.
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With the loss, the Dodgers fall to 60-49 overall and 33-21 at home. Fortunately, the Giants lost as well, meaning their lead in the NL West race is still just 2 games. In the NL Wild Card race, the Dodgers now hold just a 2 game lead over both the Marlins (won) and Cardinals (won) for home-field advantage and to make the playoffs.
The Dodgers get the Red Sox again tomorrow afternoon at 10:05 AM HST/1:05 PM PST/4:05 PM EST, with the pitching matchup being Ross Stripling (4.14 ERA/3.57 FIP/4.16 DRA) against Eduardo Rodriguez (5.91/5.57/6.80).
