Boy, is it ever time! It has been 604 days since the Great Lakes Loons have taken the field for a good old game of hard ball.
They kicked off the 2021 season with a game at home against the Dayton Dragons. It was the first game of a six-game series as each series in the Midwest League will be for six games during the 2021 season.
The Loons roster has 31 players, 17 of whom are pitchers. Fourteen of the rostered players have previously played for the Loons, although at the low-A level. This will be an interesting season as with a year and some more off it must have been difficult to place players. It appears some have been assigned to the Loons because they are age appropriate but not experience appropriate for Class A+. The expanded roster from 25 players is partially due to Covid-19 concerns and also to accommodate more players with the reduction of minor league teams.
Five of the Loons on the current roster have had no minor league experience – Morgan Cooper, Braidyn Fink, Clayton Beeter, Bobby Miller and Carson Taylor. The last three are 2020 draft selections. Cooper – a 2017 second round selection – is now 26. Fink, 23, was a 2019 selection in the 19th round. Cooper might be the most interesting story in the Dodgers minor league system this year.
The roster features a pair of 22-year-old undrafted right-handed free agent pitchers. Mike Mokma went undrafted during the 2019 draft while Cole Percival suffered the same fate during the 2020 draft which was an abbreviated draft. Mokma stands 6’7” tall while Percival is 6’5” tall.
Catcher Ryan January, 23, was taken from the Arizona Diamondbacks during the 2020 Rule 5 minor league draft.
Left-hander Ryley Widell, 23, was signed by the Dodgers in early February two days after he was released by the Twins who had drafted him the the 7th round of the 2017 draft.
The youngest player on the team is 20-year-old outfielder Andy Pages. One of the more experienced is 21-year-old right-hander Melvin Jimenez who first pitched for the Dodgers during the 2016 season. He is one that AC has been waiting on.
One of my favorites is left-hander Austin Drury, 23, who was selected by the Dodgers in the 34th round of the 2018 First-Year Player Draft. Left-hander Jeff Belge is another favorite The 23-year-old left-hander was an 18th round selection in 2019. He is legally blind in his right eye having had it injured twice.
Former catcher Austin Chubb is the manager. He is 31 years old and in his 6th season as a manager/coach in the Dodgers minor league season.
Right-hander Bobby Miller started for the Loons. His first pitch was a fastball strike and his first batter faced struck out, as did the next two. His fastball was clocked at 97 mph. On the evening he pitched three innings giving up two hits, no runs, one walk and five strikeouts.
The left side of the infield was defended for the Loons by a pair of 21-year-olds. Third base was manned by Miguel Vargas and his partner at shortstop was Leonel Valera. Valera walked in the bottom of the first inning and stole the first base of the year for the Loons.
Justin Yurchak had a single in the bottom of the fifth inning which is the first hit by a Dodger minor league player this year.
Miguel Vargas hit a two-run home run in the seventh inning for the first Dodger minor league home run in the 2021 season. He edged out Ryan Noda who hit a solo home run for the Tulsa Drillers in the second inning of their game against Armarillo.
The aforementioned Mike Mokma pitched two scoreless innings after Jesus Vargas had given up three runs and Ryley Widell an additional run each pitching 1.1 innings.
Morgan Cooper made his professional debut in the bottom of the eighth inning inducing a ground out with two out. He didn’t fare as well in the ninth inning giving up a hit and two walks but did strike out two. He exited the game having made 23 pitches. Melvin Jimenez came on to try to get the third out but walked a run in and then gave up a grand slam.
Leonel Valera hit a two-run home run in the bottom of the ninth inning.
The Loons fell 9-4 but baseball is back in Midland.
Happy to read this DC. I knew it would be hard to retire when the Minor Leagues started up. 😉
Two players on a fast track for the Loons are Pages and Miller. I would no be surprised to see either or both at AAA before years’ end!
Morgan Cooper is s fascinating story. I probably won’t attend an MLB game this year, but I will be at some games in Ft. Wayne from June 29th through July 4th. This should be a fun team to watch.
There is certainly nothing of interest to talk about with the big club right about now.
The Dodgers are a mess. Andrew Friedman is no doubt losing sleep. How do you fix it? Honestly don’t know. Maybe the Dodgers fix themselves. Maybe not. Long season.
Yah, going to watch some minor league games might be nice, but Lancaster is no more, so no games for me. Thanks Rob Manfred. I’ll check out the box scores. I still have tickets for games at Dodger Stadium, suppose to get back our regular seats beginning in June. But not sure how this all works. Word drifts out slowly, communication has been somewhat difficult.
Maybe Dylan Hernandez is right. The Dodgers have some serious flaws and won’t be an easy fix.
Maybe it’s the Farmer John curse.
Pages last night came across as one who loves to swing the bat. In his first three AB’s he saw seven pitches and swung at every one. He did draw a walk later and struck out once in five plate appearances.
Miller pitched well but as expected he didn’t seem in total sync early in the season yet was VG. He comes across as one of those expressionless pitchers. Maybe that was just his first pro experience expression and maybe he is just all business.
How come I’ve never heard of Gavin Stone?
https://ladodgertalk.com/2020/06/15/gavin-stone-from-bear-purple-to-dodger-blue/
This was posted on LADT last June.
Thank you
The Dodgers are a mess and it is a combination of injuries, World Series Letdown, Fat Catism, Focus on Social Justice Instead of Baseball, and Purely Bad Baseball Luck.
It will pass. the core is too good, but if the malaise continues another month, Doc better get his resume polished.
Complacency is insidious – and contagious.
I’ve said this before, but Doc puts the notion of resting players at predetermined intervals, benching hot players because it’s not part of The Plan, or having some overthought reliever sequence because it’s The Plan over winning now, because the objective is to peak for the playoffs. The problem is, if The Plan results in losing now, that losing can become a habit. A team forgets how to win.
Fiery managers have their uses. Tommy could be the world’s best confidence inducing cheerleader of a player when he needed the boost, but he could just as easily and just as quickly let loose a fusillade of profanity at a player if his head wasn’t properly in the game or in the moment and he needed that motivation. Tommy knew when to deploy each strategy. He probably didn’t even know he was doing it. He was just being Tommy.
Does Doc have it in him to shake things up when the team needs a shakeup?
I think the best thing that could’ve happened to Puig is if he had had a manager who would have gone full Fire and Brimstone on him – yelled at him and benched him and put the fear of God in him – when he tore up those positioning cards and tossed them on the field.
the fact he had rios in there vs beatty should be considered an actual crime.
game on the line 2 outs, and you send rios up to bat.
These days, managers have a shelf life. Especially, guys who are even-keeled, like Doc. These guys may need someone to talk to them like this:
We are losing the battle right now, but we will win the war.
Do we have to clean some things up, absolutely, but 162 is a long long season. If we were 6-20 right now it may be time to panic, actually no it wouldn’t because there would be time to turn it around.
As Mookie goes so goes the Dodgers, he will turn it around and then it will be a cascading effect.
Keep the faith, go Blue!!
They may not be 6 – 20 but they are 4 – 13 over the last 17 games. How much do they have to lose (and look bad doing it) until it isn’t all butterflies and rainbows?
So the 13-2 doesn’t count?
I choose to be optimistic, its a better way to live life.
162 is a long season….you probably thought we were dead and buried down 3-1 to ATL too.
They should call up Michael Bush, after I read this I thought he’d fit right in…
Michael Busch had a rough Double-A debut, going 0-for-4 with three strikeouts at the plate, then missed a catch for an error in the seventh inning, allowing the winning run to score.
It’s hard to get going after blowing the double header in standard fashion yesterday. That is going into extras, burning pitchers and ultimately losing the game by one run.
The bullpen keeps looking sharp until it gets into those close and late situations. We were all hoping Mitch White would shut them down yesterday, but he tested positive for whatever is going around in the Dodger’s bullpen. Whatever it is, the symptoms seem to get worse as the game progresses into the ninth and into extras.
Doc is not a good manager. It doesn’t seem like he’s good at anything except having a positive attitude all the time. Maybe he should tear up the locker room and cuss everyone out. Tommy would do just that, then throw them a bunch a crappy curveballs to embarrass them further in front of a crowd during on field batting practice.
When the entire team is not playing anywhere near their potential, who does that fall on? It really looks like they’re taking their struggles at the plate into the field.
Then there’s the questionable lineup decisions. After 8 RBI, Beaty can’t get a start in a freaking double header? Are you kidding me? Beaty and Pollock should have been moved into the 4 and 5 hole after that game. Keep riding the hot hand. If Muncy has to sit out a few games, so be it. Put him back in after Beaty draws an 0-fer.
Everyone wants to complain about the bullpen, but when you’re team constantly keeps you in tight games, you’re bound to have that extra pressure lead to discouraging results. The hitters have to do better and it starts with riding the hot hand.
Let Smith and Ruiz split the catching duties down the middle except when Kersh demands his personal catcher (not much help yesterday). Let Barnes pinch hit, play a little second base if Lux struggles early in the game. You have to let Lux start on defense since he’s the only one of the infield with any range at all. Sit Seager for a game the day after he misses a ball by an inch while failing to leave his feet. Taylor, Pollock, Turner and Betts shouldn’t be getting rest until they have a bad showing at the plate. Don’t sit them after a multi-hit game because it was previously scheduled.
The whole team is sucking right now and the disease has spread to the starting rotation with poor showings by both starting pitchers yesterday. Did the bullpen game have anything to do with this? I’m wondering if their goal of getting to 85% vaccinated is getting in the way of their goal to repeat. I sure hope this is vaccine side effects and not that everyone sucks all of the sudden. Except Doc, he’s always sucked but the talent on the team has disguised that fact to most.
i would NOT sit muncy. his obp is too high. but if he is now going to be a walk machine he should be batting 2nd. he is actually become to valuable at 1st to sit. he has the highest defensive runs saved in the league at 1st.
Ahh, DRS in a small sample size we can make some valuable decisions.
Will Smith (3) should start all games at catcher with Barnes (0) only catching when he needs rest.
Muncy is the leader in DRS with 5 in 216 innings, but Rios has a 2 DRS in just 55 innings. That’s on pace for somewhere between 7 and 8 DRS if he had Muncy’s innings.
I wonder if anyone noticed that Gavin Lux has a 3 DRS in just 132 innings in the field. Again, extrapolated to Muncy’s innings somewhere between 5 and 6. Only McMahon, Edman and McNeil are better in all of baseball.
Who knew that the best shortstop in baseball, Francisco Lindor would be 12th best fielder at the position. With his sub 200 BA, they might as well cut him and eat that contract.
Ha-seong Kim (3) DRS in just 78 innings would make him the best fielder at the toughest position if it weren’t for Mauricio Dubon (4) DRS in just 66 innings. Tatis Jr. (-4), Xander Bogaerts (-5) are making Seager (-3) look like Ozzie Smith considering Seager has played more innings than both. Maybe all of them should be moved to the AL where they can DH full time.
I guess we can call JT the inverse of Max Muncy. Worst in baseball with a (-5) DRS, but he can hit. Muncy can feild, be can’t hit. How are both on the field every day when their numbers are so opposite?
Did you all know that Nick Castellanos is as good a fielder as Mookie Betts? Both tied at 1 DRS. Verdugo sits at 0. Surprised, so is Heyward. Cole Calhoun, Hitch Haniger, Acuna Jr are all close to the bottom of the league at -1. Aaron Judge (-3) would be the worst right fielder if it weren’t for Gallo and Polanco, tied at -4.
Weirdly Kike Hernandez (1) is a better Center Fielder than Mookie Betts (0) who is equally bad as Corenzo Cain and Bradley Jr., also at (0). Mike Trout, it’s time for a position change sitting at (-2).
Surprisingly, the guy that everyone complains about, AJ Pollock (2) is sitting in the number 6 spot for left fielders right behind (wait for it) notoriously horrible Kyle Schwarber (3). Most impressive is Marcell Ozuna, after DHing all last year is tied with Pollock at (2). Surprises towards the bottom are notoriously good Michael Brantley and Christian Yellick, both sitting at (0).
Stop acting like DRS is a stat that matters, or something that provides any useful information at all after 30 games.
the larger point is that muncy GETS ON BASE, he is just not hitting. i would still play him & have him bat 2nd, though i agree with some that MAYBE 8th would be better for him. and rios, cannot field, run, walk, OR HIT. he needs to go back down.
I agree that Rios needs to go down for a week or two. Muncy should have been benched for a couple of games or until Beaty cooled off with Beaty taking over at first. Now that Doc has cooled Beaty, it probably doesn’t matter.
I’m just pointing out the obvious and that is DRS means absolutely nothing in a small sample size and relatively little as the sample size grows larger. So, you can’t justify keeping Muncy in the lineup because of his DRS and hardly justify it just because he walks.
Take this into consideration. Here’s how Muncy ranks among qualified 1st baseman…
Slg – 18
Ave – 19
K’s – 6
OBP – 3
OPS – 12
What does this mean? He can’t hit, overall power isn’t there, misses a ton and his OBP is pulling up his OPS making him look not that bad.
It’s freaking really bad when you’re first baseman is at the top in K’s and at the bottom in SLG and Ave. Walks are great for a leadoff hitter, not a cleanup hitter. This is a BIG problem and DRS has nothing to make this any prettier!
I am as furious at Roberts’ decisions as the rest of you.
I am as furious at the lack of defense as the rest of you.
I am as furious at the lack of offense as the rest of you.
I seem to remember I was really upset in 2017 when we were playing lousy baseball and started with the same 17-14 record as we have today.
We won 70 of the next 90 games and finished the season with 104 wins.
Ah, Sanity!
Yes, “it’s always darkest before the dawn!”
Some general Dodger info found on Internet:
MLB Scouts Identify 28 Prospects Turning Heads Entering 2021 Minor League Season
https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/mlb-scouts-identify-28-prospects-turning-heads-entering-2021-minor-league-season/
Bobby Miller, Landon Knack, and Andy Pages featured here as 3 of the 28. Knack’s changeup “consistently showed plus and flashed at 70-grade” and Pages “can absolutely hammers fastballs.”
Kevin Goldstein Chat:
Scrapper: Fill in the blanks: 80 games of Kris Bryant gets the Cubs __ top __ prospects in a mid-season trade.
Kevin Goldstein: Probably one headliner and then another piece or two with some kind of attractive qualities. Bryant has looked outstanding this year.
Dallas Comegys: IF Jose Ramirez gets traded, can a Dodgers offer of Lux, Ruiz, plus prospects be realistically topped?
Kevin Goldstein: It can be.
Jonathan: Thoughts on Willie Calhoun rest of year?
Kevin Goldstein: I was just looking at him yesterday, and I’m encouraged.
Jay Jaffe Chat
Estevão: Mookie Betts is the fifth best hitter on the Dodgers? Thoughts
Avatar Jay Jaffe: Betts has been a bit banged up; he missed a couple days due to lower back stiffness and then got drilled on the right forearm. I don’t think there’s much to worry about here; his 121 wRC+ is still solid, and the Dodgers do have a bunch of good hitters, though their recent slide suggests they’re missing Cody Bellinger more than before, and their depth has taken a few other hits.
Estevão: I’m not concerned about Betts I simply believe the order os Seager, Bellinger, Turner, Muncy, Betts, Smith
Jay Jaffe: Don’t forget Chris Taylor, whose 138 wRC+ since the start of last year is only three points below Betts in that span.
Raphie C: The Padres are going through it with elbow injuries in a seemingly unprecedented way. How much of this can be tied to the new ways of high velo baseball vs. Larry Rothschild vs. plain dumb luck?
Jay Jaffe: I’m sure that there’s no way you’re going to get any kind of without-a-doubt link between the new ball and a cluster of injuries on one team, and it probably has less to do with one pitching coach than it does with some combination of dumb luck and the training staff.
That said, the Padres really have had a cluster. 11 pitchers in the organization have undergone Tommy John surgery since last March, and Dinelson Lamet had a UCL sprain. The handling of Lamet and Mike Clevinger has raised some eyebrows as they seem to be convinced they can send these guys back out there sooner rather than later.
Old friend Kenta Maeda making mistakes:
https://blogs.fangraphs.com/kenta-maeda-has-made-a-lot-of-mistakes/
Forest Stulting on Pepiot, Kendall Williams and Michael Busch amongst others
https://www.baseballprospectus.com/prospects/article/66403/monday-morning-ten-pack-updates-from-minor-league-spring-training/
Teaser: He loves Pepiot’s change!
Dodgers odds to win it all have fallen by 40 cents (more or less, kinda.)
From 3:1 to 3.4:1
https://www.betonline.ag/
Last update had an article on the Padres, shifting. Here’s one on the Dodgers:
https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-dodgers-might-have-a-shifting-strategy-of-their-own/
Dustin Nosler, underrated IMHO, has capped off his prospect list for the Dodgers with Jo gray:
http://dodgersdigest.com/2021/05/03/2021-dodgers-top-50-prospects-no-1-rhp-josiah-gray/
Another thing that makes Dodger Stadium unique, it’s batters’ boxes.
https://uni-watch.com/2021/05/05/chalk-talk-the-unique-batters-boxes-of-dodger-stadium/
The great Ken Rosenthal on injuries being “up” this season:
https://theathletic.com/2567674/2021/05/05/rosenthal-mlb-injuries-are-up-again-in-2021-and-the-sport-is-nowhere-near-solving-the-problem/
At Rancho Park, Gavin Stone sat 90-92 at Central Arkansas last year. The Dodgers fifth-rounder sat 94-96 for three innings tonight. Pounded the strike zone, lots of swings and misses on his fastball. 3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 6 K. Rancho Park also saw Brandon Lewis getting a bit of run at 3B.
At Great Lakes, the reports that Leonel Valera has bulked up a bit this offseason seems to be true with a nice oppo homer. 2017 2nd round pick Morgan Cooper started. He was a little wild, but got his first two pro strikeouts, both looking, both on secondary stuff. Showed a fastball, curveball, and changeup.
And finally, I’m reposting a nice little twitter rant about the Astros from Jarrett Seidler
The righteous indignation everyone involved with the late-teens Astros has—and I mean everyone, from ownership to the front office to the players to the fans—when they got caught in the largest cheating scandal in a century is one of the most genuinely bizarre things I’ve seen…
You are not a victim whose name got unfairly tainted; at best you benefitted as a bystander, and also like seriously people were calling out Luhnow et al. for incredibly shitty behavior from almost day 1. It ain’t like the cheating was the first clue that things were fucked there.
This has now extended to significant chunks of the media, and not even just the local media. I do not get it at all! They did a lot of bad shit, got caught at a fraction of it, and basically everyone involved except Carlos Beltrán got an incredibly soft landing.
And yeah, the Yankees and the league office and all don’t have totally clean hands either. MLB has a lot of bad actors. But that doesn’t absolve the Astros of blatantly cheating their way to a World Series or harassing reporters over Osuna or trading for Osuna to begin with, etc
Thanks, Bluto.
We could do Bluto’s Blog Biscuits every Wednesday. 😉
I’m in. Make Bluto official. Love this stuff.
Hi Mark,
Due to work constraints I’d like to keep it “unofficial”. IOW, I can’t really commit to compiling and delivering.
SORRY.
That said, it’s your blog and I’d have no problem if you want to manipulate or re-publish in any way/shape/form.
Geez Bluto. Get your priorities straight. Quit your job!
I have that thought ALL THE TIME!
The woman I’m related to by marriage wouldn’t take kindly too it.
Nor would my spawn.
Thanks for all the links, some good reads there. Best of Maeda last year, worst of Maeda this year. The old adage of letting someone go a year early vs a year late applies. Ryu is still going good, even if he has officially turned into Blake Snell, averaging a little over 5 innings a start.
How old is sweetpea now Bluto ? And give my regards to Olive
I was thinking that maybe AF could call in that motivational speaker that the New York Knights had in ” The Natural”…Losing is a disease….ahh, but curable. I have seen them play worse. What I had not seen to this point was an entire team’s offense plating like baseball is a game foreign to them.
Listen Timmons, I know you think you are God’s gift to blogging, but your arrogance is just amazing. You say you want dialogue and all that jazz, but the reality is you just want everyone to agree with you. If they don’t agree, you start the name calling, each and every time. Wasn’t it you that said we should refrain from those attacks? Pull your head out of your condescending arrogant ass and live by your own words, you are bombastic, you don’t have everything as correct as you think, GET OVER YOURSELF
Timmons: “Well, if you want to be juvenile or moronic, you are free to do so.
Keep it up – it shows your lack of intellect very clearly!”
Your projection is quite consistent. Your whole approach to others is truly defined by those sentences I just quoted. GROW UP, quit acting like a child, be a man! Have some class!
That was in response to your childish proclivity to try and troll people not just me.
You do it a subtle way. I try and be direct with what I say so that we are all clear.
If you start something as you did in the last thread, rest assured I will respond in kind!
If you don’t like the response, don’t start it!
I meant every word of it including the part you left out:
“You are a little internet troll! Aren’t you soooo proud?”
If you don’t want to be treated like a troll, then don’t act like one.
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i would have just said “hey don’t be a dick, OOPS too late”
but you are much more eloquent than that
Easy to argue that it’s the injuries – but here’s the thing. The Dodgers have had 10 guys placed on the IL this year – but the Giants have had 11 and the Pads 17. Everyone has to overcome injuries and the Dodgers are supposed to have the depth to do so. But the depth pieces haven’t looked too good so far.
Perhaps we are seeing what some Posters in here feared might happen when we failed to improve our Roster on the offensive side?
Perhaps some people who watch a lot of team sports realised that going back to back in any code is immensely difficult, and Championship Hangovers are not uncommon, hence the need to incrementally improve again, and freshen things up, so that players do not rest on their collective laurels.
Perhaps letting two of the most popular Teammates and greatest Cheerleaders walk at the same time has had a detrimental effect?
Perhaps this, in addition to jettisoning two vital Bullpen pieces in favour of trying to shoe horn ex Starters into Relief roles, might also have had a negative effect?
Perhaps this is a marathon and not a sprint, and non of the above has any relevance?
There is truth in all of that.
It is a marathon but it does have relevance. They can’t continue down this path. I was serious about what I said about Roberts.
Team fielding bible listed the Dodgers as the fourth best fielding team last year, and the top team in 2019. I’m not sure what fielded needed to be addressed in the offseason.
So far, we sit right in the middle at 16th overall. I’m pretty sure this is World Series hangover, but JT and Seager are sure pulling those numbers down at critical positions. Lux and Muncy are way above average right now. I’m sure when Belli returns and Mookie goes back to RF full time a lot of this will be better. The only real concern is how bad Barnes, Turner and Seager are right now.
Barnes has been a top defensive catcher, so I don’t think that will linger. Seager is too young to drop off so significantly, so again it probably isn’t permanent. But, Turner really scares me. He’s very old, so it’s not obvious that it’s going to get a lot better and you can’t take his bat out of the lineup.
You have the marathon part exactly right Watford. I have seen way too much baseball to even come close to panicking at this point. Arguably their best player in the series, Seager, their spark plug, Betts, their top prospect at the MLB level, Lux, both of their catchers, Smith and Barnes, none of these are performing at the levels expected. The offense over the last couple of weeks, the pen, the starters, the bench, none of those has been playing anywhere close to the level expected. The loss of May is a huge blow since both of the pitchers in line to take his place in the rotation are not ready to do so yet. A bullpen that is lights out one minute and a gas truck the next. Bad umpiring, too many strikeouts, too many men left on base. And their depth has been found lacking. No one expected Rios to be this bad. Bellinger still a couple of weeks away, despite all of the adversity, they are within striking distance and have not yet played the Giants, This trip has been a disaster, that is true. They need a win to head home on, But I would bet that AF is monitoring the situation closely. He is not going to let this get out of hand. Moves will happen, When is the only question. Mets fired both of their hitting coaches,
i am getting worried about seager’s fielding these days. it seems HE NEVER dives for balls. if not in the area he can “reach”, seems like a hit every time.
Last night Rancho Cucamonga Quakes pitchers struckout 21 batters in a 1-0 9 inning game!
Buehler pitching today and I have a good feeling the worm is going to turn.
I thought that yesterday. I saw the light at the end of the tunnel. Turns out it was a train !
More like the light at the end of the barrel right before the bullet hits you in the face! 😉 Ouch!
The only thing I feel good about in the short term is that they aren’t going to play like this forever. The team as a whole is way too talented. You just don’t have a team full of All-stars and former All-stars start playing like they’re in low A and continue that way for a full season. I still have ABSOLUTELY NO DOUBT that they will be in a position to win the division by year’s end. There is no way than an older crappier SF team is going to finish higher in the standings unless the injury toll keeps on piling on. The only team we need to worry about is SD who is pretty much just as bad, the only real difference is the 4 game series in LA when we began this slide.
The most likely scenario is that any day now, the team will turn this mess around and go on a run that will put in a modest lead by the end of May and continue to grow for the rest of the year with a couple of augmenting moves at the All-star break.
Yep, I was on the train home from Portland…..ran right over em.
Corey Seager – .200 AVG, 23 games
Max Muncy – .089 AVG, 18 games
Mookie Betts – .237 AVG, 19 games
Gavin Lux – .167 AVG, 19 games
Will Smith – .194 AVG, 20 games
Austin Barnes – .167 AVG, 16 games
Edwin Rios – .078 AVG, all season
That hurts my eyes!
I knew that the Dodgers were not a 13-2 team.
I also know that they are not a 4-12 team.
I know I have seen some crazy streaks and crazy stuff over the years.
I know that the Dodgers are playing as badly as you can play.
I know it will not stay like this.
As I posted a few days ago, the 2019 Nats were 24-33 at the end of May and won 93 games along with the World Series.
So until we are 24-33, I am not going to panic.
BTW, the team who set the MLB Win Record and never lost a series all year, did not win the World Series.
But the 1906 Cubs did GO to the World Series – they were 116 – 36 and have the best W – L record of all time. (and 4 Hall of Famers, including 3 Finger Brown who was 26 – 6 with a 1.04 ERA)
See, I think that is an unfair advantage to only have 3 fingers. It’s unnatural, I tell you!
The old days when nicknames could often come from people’s obvious physical characteristics. Walter “no neck “Williams. Etc
I’m glad I never was interested in betting on baseball. I would have taken the Cubs yesterday against CK and Bauer with a soft-tossing vet and a rookie?
* Many here are grouping at straws asking for the next rookie to be called up and be a savior especially since Lux and more so, Rios, aren’t cutting it, so let’s try Michael Bush?
* It’s becoming increasingly apparent that many young prospects are suffering from the lack of minor league baseball last year. Even the alternate site doesn’t provide anything like real games and competition. So, do you bring up other inexperienced guys likely over their heads or do you stay with current ineffective guys? Hard question. Now Beaty is the answer? Where do you play him?
* Doc’s getting hell but who’s he supposed to play? He isn’t pitching, hitting or playing defense. He pitched 12 of his 13 guys yesterday in 14 innings and lost 2 games. Getting 5 innings out of your 2 starters is a killer. We scored 4 runs yesterday in 2 games.
* I question Doc’s individual moves sometimes. I don’t think he’s a good game manager. For example, in extra innings when the “ghost-runner” of the home team advanced to 3rd with 1 out, I am walking the next batter no matter what. And maybe 2, if I trust my pitcher’s control and hate the match up. But to me, the match up takes a back seat to trying to get a ONE ground ball double-play to get out of the inning. Last night I would have walked Bode every time, to pitch to Hayward. Would that have changed the outcome? Who knows?
* If it seems like there are more injuries, league wide, this year so far, you’re right. I’ve watched the White Sox lose Jimenez and Robert both for the year. Hip flexor tears on ground out? We’re seeing pitchers we’ve never heard of with minimal track records get ML time as pitchers go on the IL.
Today in the Athletic, Ken Rosenthal reports:
“Information provided to The Athletic from an independent firm that studies injury data shows placements on the injured list increased by 15 percent from the first month of 2019 to the first month of ’21 The increase for pitchers was 22 percent that’s 69 arm/elbow placements on the IL. Up 19% from 2019”.
It will be extremely interesting to see how the minor league guys who haven’t played in 18 months survive 140 games.
Let’s see what this team is made of , how bad they want to extract a little payback for yesterday. Play for some pride.
Speaking of the minor leagues, OKC finally released it’s roster and it ain’t pretty. Devoid of talent would be an understatement. Have we seen Zach Recks yet? Can we hope that Cristian Santana fixed his High K low Walk mediocre power and borderline fielding problems during the COVID year?
The big names are
DJ Peters
Zach Recks
Cristian Santana
Omar Esteves
And for Honorable Mention Matt Davidson
Omar Esteves at the ripe old age of 23 is the YOUNGEST position player on the roster.
I looked through OKC and Tulsa rosters and found a few names that I forgot all about…
Yasiel Sierra is still hanging out at age 29
Kevin Quackenbush is a name that sounds familiar. Am I mistaking him for someone who was good once? (32)
Steven Souza Jr? (32)
Not a lot of interesting names at AAA, so I checked in on Tulsa. Got a lot of dudes in the infield. Hoese, Busch, Amaya and even an old time friend Devin Mann. An outfield of Kendall, Noda and Rincon does not inspire confidence.
Like the infield, the staff is loaded with big names. Grove and Pepiot are there. So is Carillo, Jackson as are Varland, Robertson and others. I was surprised to see Yadier Alvarez, then I saw he was on the IL and the memories came roaring back. He has a lot of baggage for a 25 year old. He was the big reason that the Dodgers blew their big spend on a bunch of Cubans that year. Is Omar Estevez the only one left?
Remember this?
The Dodgers as expected have made a big splash on the first day of the 2015-2016 international signing period, with reported signings of top international prospects Yadier Alvarez, outfielder Starling Heredia, shortstop Ronny Brito and infielder Oneil Cruz, among others.
There are people here who have been watching baseball for more than 50 years and every time the team goes through a bad time they want to change all the players, fire the manager, hire the player who is on fire, etc, etc.
They have not learned that this happens every season, as the Dodgers have shown, even in winning teams of more than 100 games, these players are young and they have done it in the past, they will return, the waters will take their level.
Do you want to worry about the real thing ?, then worry about the defense of the infield on the left side, worry that the closer cannot be used for two consecutive days and cannot throw two innings when sometimes it is necessary, worry that the pitching staff allows many bases Stolen, those concerns are real and can cost a lot of losses in low-scoring games.
Your first sentence is a stupid generalization which holds no water. If anything the older fans on this board are more likely to be patient in this circumstance. If you are going to attack someone be specific.
Eddie Rios to the IL with a shoulder injury. Edwin Uceta is coming back to fill the spot.
Scott Alexander has been dealing with some arm soreness.
Brusdar will be going to Arizona soon, not coming back anytime soon.
Sounds like were going to see Kelly pretty soon.
Will it be Machine Gun Kelly or Wildman Kelly or Popgun Kelly?
I’m generally optimistic about our guys until they prove me wrong. Machine Gun is gonna come out firing. Can you imagine if gains any control or velocity as a result?
Our next 5 games after tonight are against AL teams. I really hope that Keibert gets some starts in that series since we’ll have the DH. If they just plan to have him warm the bench they should send him to OKC so he can get some playing time.
Home against the M’s, no DH. I suggested splitting 20 40 40. Kershaw and his buddy Barnes then split the rest between Will and K-Bear for a while.
Finding new ways to lose every game.
How did we get to having Santana pitch in late and close games?
This bullpen is a mess. Especially since Gonsolin is probably going to be a starter.
Seager is looking more and more like a left fielder with every game he plays at short
The season in a microcosm. 5 hits in 9 innings. Another reliever allowing baserunners in the late inning coming around to score; another error on Seager.
The Dodgers are 1 – 5 in extra innings and now we have another one. Anyone want to bet on the outcome?
Nice relay hey.
JT is as slow as I am.
But JT can hit.
We suck so bad. AF did not build a good bullpen.
Great!!! 3 Blown saves in 1 game, does Roberts know relievers can pitch more than 1 inning?
Fun times!
Okay, I am officially on the Kenley Jansen has to go bandwagon. And sorry, Cleavinger does not inspire great confidence either. But aside from that, this offense stinks. Way too many K’s. Way too many strikes taken with the bat sitting on the hitters shoulder. And the offense is going to remain stagnant until Betts starts playing like a 30 million dollar player instead of the 1 million dollar utility player. Embarrassing moment of the game, Joc Pederson’s premature bat flip. I also officially hate the runner on second rule,. They also blew a chance to gain a game on the Giants and fall into third with the Pads win over the Pirates.
Floro and Kolarek would look real good right now. The Dodgers bullpen is full of players who don’t belong on big league rosters now like a guy who walks a .150 hitter to bring Rizzo up. Doc has been awful as well. Seager’s play at SS cost them another game tonight. This team is an absolute mess and have not been rising to the challenge whatsoever.
The players are performing horribly now, but the manager could help them out a little. In the 11th inning, with two outs, a 5-4 lead, and a lefty on the mound, he does not walk RH Duffy(hitting .300) to get to LH Wolters(hitting .150).
At the very least he should pitch around Duffy. Instead, without a mound visit, Clevinger grooves a first pitch fastball right down the middle and the game is tied.
And then the Cubs do things that you never see the Dodgers do. They stole second against a LHP with 2 outs and nothing to lose. And then Rizzo chokes up and with 2 strikes hits a ground ball to the opposite field against the shift.
The players lost the game, but the manager and coaches also need to be better.
Headline: DODGERS A MESS AS LOSING STREAK CONTINUES
This loss cannot be blamed on the bullpen. All the Dodgers need is to score some runs and keep these games out of extra innings. In fact, the only difference between the winning hit and Mookie’s final out with runners on in the top of the inning, was that the ball Mookie hit did not have eyes and the winning hit did. Mookie hit the ball harder, but directly at the shortstop.
Three things that can lead to losses in low-scoring games:
1 The defense (range) of the left side of the infield, any ball hit on the ground out there, four feet from 3B and the SS has a lot of chance that it will pass as a hit, that doesn’t go to the scoreboard as a mistake, but a lot of those balls should have been caught and outs.
2 The pitchers are easily stolen bases, a hit, a BB is practically a double, the catchers don’t have a chance.
3 The closer is unreliable and cannot pitch on consecutive days, nor when necessary, like today’s game, he cannot pitch more than one inning.
The loss of Knebel is very hard, because he cannot be substituted internally, he and Treinen would have had a fabulous duet by the eighth and ninth inning.