Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers won a pitchers’ duel last night, giving them a seventh consecutive victory and a league-high 18th win of the season. The Dodgers won both games against the Mariners in LA, and now the series heads up to Seattle for two more games.
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| 6:40 P.M. | Seattle | ||
| RF | Betts | SS | Crawford (L) |
| SS | Seager (L) | 2B | Moore |
| 3B | Turner | CF | Lewis |
| CF | Bellinger (L) | 3B | Seager (L) |
| 1B | Muncy (L) | C | Nola |
| LF | Pollock | 1B | White |
| DH | Pederson (L) | DH | Lopes (L) |
| 2B | Taylor | LF | Haggerty (S) |
| C | Ruiz (S) | RF | Bishop |
| P | Urias (L) | P | Walker (R) |
Julio Urias gets his fifth start of the season, and the first four have gone pretty well. He’s yet to allow more than five hits or two runs in a game and is coming off his longest start of the season, a 6 1/3 inning outing against the Padres. He allowed two runs and didn’t walk a batter, but allowed his first two homers of the season and struck out a season-low three batters. He’s only struck out 13 batters in 21 1/3 innings, which feels insanely low for a guy with Urias’ stuff.
Taijuan Walker gets his fifth start of the season today. Walker began his career in Seattle before being traded to Arizona in November 2016. Walker only pitched one full season (2017) in Arizona, as Tommy John surgery in April 2018 cost him most of that season and all but one start in 2019.
Walker was pretty good in 2017, posting a 3.49 ERA/4.04 FIP in 157 1/3 innings. In 2020 he’s alternated between good and bad starts so far, which should bode well for the Dodgers today. In his first and third starts this season, Walker allowed nine runs in seven innings and only struck out four batters. In his second start of the season, Walker held the A’s to one hit over seven innings and struck out a season-high eight batters. Last time out, Walker allowed one unearned run in six innings with five strikeouts.
Walker has a five-pitch mix. He most often throws a four-seam fastball (37.4 percent) that averages 93 MPH so far in 2020. He throws a cutter and sinker (20.9 and 12.6 percent, respectively), and uses a splitter (19.6 percent) and curveball (9.5 percent) as his offspeed offerings.
Keibert Ruiz starts behind the plate today, giving an off-day to apparently the best catcher in baseball Austin Barnes? Chad wrote about Barnes earlier, and while we probably shouldn’t get that excited about like seven games of Barnes not hitting like a pitcher, it’s definitely good to see. The Mariners made a couple transactions in between series, as Daniel Vogelbach was designated for assignment. Braden Bishop and Sam Haggerty were both called up today and are both in the lineup.
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More like Tony Gone-solin.
Let the record show Allan tried to stop me from making that joke.
Tony Gonsolin was optioned back to the alternate training site after another good start yesterday. The Dodgers finally have an off day on Monday, which means they’re likely returning to a five-man rotation. Gonsolin is probably one of the five best starting options they have, so it’ll be interesting to see how long he’s down this time.
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The Dodgers return home on Friday, but still have a three-man taxi squad for these two games in Seattle.
Josh Sborz, Rocky Gale and Zach McKinstry are available if needed.
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Alex Wood will throw another simulated game Monday.
Dave Roberts said Alex Wood is scheduled to throw another simulated game Monday.
— Jorge Castillo (@jorgecastillo) August 19, 2020
Gonsolin should probably be considered for a spot in the rotation before Wood, but who knows how that will shake out.
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First pitch is scheduled for 6:40 PM PST and will be shown on Sportsnet LA.
