Giants @ Dodgers July 22, 2021: Buehler goes for a series split

It goes without saying that last night’s game sucked as the Dodgers (59-38) are now hoping to split the series with the Giants (60-35) and remain 1 game back of first in the NL West, exactly where they were coming into the four-game set.

While there’s three games against the Rockies this weekend (with the Giants hosting the Pirates), the teams will meet again for three more in San Francisco beginning on Tuesday with last night and tonight’s pitching matchups tentatively scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday. After that, the Dodgers and Giants are done until September when they wrap up their play against each other with three more games in San Francisco.

	7:10 PM		Los Angeles
1B	Wade Jr. (L)	SS	Taylor
C	Posey	2B	Muncy (L)
RF	Yastrzemski (L)	3B	Turner
3B	Flores	C	Smith
LF	Dickerson (L)	1B	Beaty (L)
2B	Solano	CF	Bellinger (L)
CF	Duggar (L)	LF	Pollock
SS	Estrada	RF	McKinney (L)
P	DeSclafani (R)	P	Buehler (R)

Walker Buehler and Anthony DeSclafani will make their fourth starts against the Giants and Dodgers respectively. As I mentioned in last night’s miserable recap, Beuhler has allowed 2 ER (4 total) across 19 2/3 innings against the Giants this year. Striking out 15 to 5 walks, Buehler earned the win in two of the starts while the bullpen gave up 6 runs on May 28 to spoil a potential third win.

Two of DeSclafani’s worst starts this season came against the Dodgers, going 2 2/3 IP on May 23 and 4 2/3 IP on May 28 when he faced Buehler.will also make his fourth start against the Dodgers this season.

Buehler enters with a 2.37 ERA/3.34 FIP/3.71 xFIP in 121 1/3 IP this season to DeSclafani’s 2.78 ERA/3.63 FIP/3.95 xFIP across 113 1/3 IP.

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The newest addition to the team, Billy McKinney, makes his debut for the Dodgers tonight with Zach Reks sent back to Oklahoma City. Chris Taylor remains in the leadoff spot and Justin Turner is back in the starting lineup.

Mookie Betts, Max Muncy and Will Smith all connected for solo homers against DeSclafani at the end of June, with Matt Beaty and Gavin Lux getting him in his May starts.

Betts is still out of the lineup, opening up right field for McKinney, as conversations continue about sending him to the IL. He’s already missed half of the 10 days he would have had he gone on originally after leaving the game in Denver.

#Dodgers manager Dave Roberts continues to say that Mookie Betts is day to day. Said the IL is a "topic of conversation internally" but they haven't decided.

— Juan Toribio (@juanctoribio) July 22, 2021

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In some other injury news, Jimmy Nelson is getting closer to returning and Corey Knebel is looking at starting a rehab assignment soon.

#Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said Jimmy Nelson could be activated Sunday or Tuesday. Will depend on how he's feeling after throwing a sim game today.

— Juan Toribio (@juanctoribio) July 22, 2021

Knebel said curveball command will be the key indicator of how close he is to returning to action: "Today there were some bad ones at the beginning. The last 6 or 7 pitches, 4 of those were curveballs and they were great. I’m close."

— J.P. Hoornstra (@jphoornstra) July 22, 2021

It goes without saying, but both could/will play significant roles in the bullpen down the stretch. I just wrote about some of the ok/mediocre pieces that would seem to be realistic options to eat up some innings down the stretch, but these two could provide a much larger impact.

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First pitch is set for 7:10 p.m. on SportsNet LA as well as ESPN+ according to my own account.