Every now and then, it is all about random stuff:
- So, did Chris Taylor get a stay of execution, at least until Max Muncy comes back from the IL?
- Shohei Ohtani tries too hard with runners on (HR included).
- The Dodgers might sit Vargas for a game or two, just so he is not too amped up. He is an excitable guy who can get too geeked out to his detriment.
- The bottom four in the lineup got five hits. That’s progress. Kike rose to the occasion.
- Teoscar might sit against tough RHP… he is struggling against them while killing LHP.
Ambidextrous Freak
Jason Gay in the Wall Street Journal has a piece entitled:
This Amazing Pitcher Throws 95 MPH Right-Handed—and 93 MPH Left-Handed -Ambidextrous ace Jurrangelo Cijntje is no gimmick—he is a legit major-league prospect helping Mississippi State try to return to the College World Series
His unearthly gift must be seen to be believed: a right-handed college pitcher, confident on the hill, in command of several pitches, his fastball blazing well into the mid-90s.
— Jason Gay
Then—behold!—he switches his custom Wilson glove to his opposite hand, adjusts his feet, turns his body and does it all over again…left-handed.
His name is Jurrangelo Cijntje (pronounced SAIN-ja), and he’s a 20-year-old “switch-pitching” phenomenon from Curaçao, by way of the Netherlands and Florida, currently helping 16th-ranked Mississippi State make a charge to the College World Series.
At the moment, Cijntje holds a 7-1 record with 89 strikeouts over 70 innings. He would be a major-league prospect if he merely threw from the right side, where his repertoire includes a sizzling fastball, curve, slider and change-up.
Down on the Farm
OKC BOX Now that Vargas is up with the big club, if I look at the OKC NO NAMES among the position players, I see just two prospects, namely Austin Gauthier and possibly Andre Lipcuis (who might be a AAAA player). After a fast start, Kody Hoese is sinking like a boulder. Avans and Ward are both AAAA players.
Jared “No Walks” Karros was promoted to AA and was rudely treated as he went 3.2 innings and gave up seven hits and six runs while walking six batters. He walked 13 in 38 innings at GL. He can only get better… right? Cartaya hit his 4th HR. The Drillers closed out the game with a triple play.
Jackson Ferris was rocked again, but this is typical… he will move past it.
DePaula is smoking hot as he was 3-4 with 4 RBI, including 2 HR
Joendry Vargas went 1-2 with two BB and scored three runs.
On Monday I wrote that I was getting worried about the lack of power by dePaula. Looks like I jinxed him in a very positive way.:-)
Keep it up , kid!
And Cartayas swing looks a lot more compact than previously. Should suit him fine in rasiong the average. The power is in no question regardless.
Lets see what Vargas can do in his second stint with the parent club.
Fingers crossed for the young man!
Go Dodgers!!!!!!!!
This is Vargas’s third stint in the majors, not his second. Will the third time be the charm?
To recap: He got about 50 ABs at the end of ’22, and even though he had a sub-Mendoza performance, he was rewarded with a spot on the playoff roster, which made no sense to me.
Despite his weak debut, the brass still had such faith in Miguelito’s promise that he was gift-wrapped the 2B job next spring. Even though Vargas was nursing a hand injury, guys like Michael Busch, Luke Williams and Jahmai Jones weren’t given a fair chance to compete for the job. Again: Made no sense to me.
Vargas struggled on both offense and defense before he was sent down to OKC after about 250 ABs. The silver lining is that Mookie moved to 2B, providing more playing time for Heyward.
Anyway, here’s hoping that Miguel breaks out this time–and does so in a big way. One problem: He seems likely to see action against lefties, but Roberts still wants to find ABs for Chris Taylor too. Will Vargas get that “runway” against both lefties and righties?
Best case: He establishes himself as the Dodgers’ left-fielder of the future.
For the last time (I’ll beat on this dead horse), it’s good knowing Vargas tonight gets his first crack at starting with the parent club against a RHP. Hopefully this shows the Dodgers don’t plan on platooning him based strictly on righty v lefty pitching. Just give Miguel the same AB opportunities they gave Andy when they initially brought him up.
Let me pound that horse from another direction….
Vargas got the chance to hit both lefties and righties in ’23 when he started at 2B. He got about 250 ABs and hit below the Mendoza line. So he did get the same AB opportunity that Pages got–actually, more of an opportunity, since Pages has only had 109 ABs so far.
It would be nice if Vargas was granted full-time action at LF, but the Dodgers also seem rightfully committed to full-time action for Teoscar (he makes the big bucks) and Pages, who is slumping now but has thoroughly outplayed Vargas in the ML.
Does Heyward and his gold glove sit to give Vargas extra ABs? Don’t think so. And of course Roberts says he’s still hoping to find ABs for Taylor.
FWIW, Vargas hit ML righties a bit better than he hit lefties in “23. He batted .206 against righties and .171 against lefties
Before the season, many in the media were calling the Dodgers a Super Team. We’re still early, but are they a super team or just a good baseball team? We’ll know more, of course, at the end of June.
At this point, I’d say a good team, but with potential to become a great team. We’ll see.
The Dodgers are using every piece of tech they have to try to keep pitchers healthy. Obviously, not working. No one in MLB has any answers. Pitchers continue to fall. Elbows, shoulders etc.
Seems to be getting worse, not better. Is it weights? The lifting program? The Dodgers were warned decades ago about weights. Are players trying to bulk up too much. More strains and pulls these days.
Is it travel ball in their youth. Too much baseball. Baseball players suffering more injuries at a younger age. Repetitive injuries on the rise. Athletes use to play multiple sports back in the day. Not so much now. Hey, the high school season never really end. Summer, fall and winter. Play another sport? It’s frowned upon.
Shame to see so many talented players going down.
It doesn’t appear that baseball has any answers. Hey, we’ll limit the of number of pitches or innings. You see that with the Dodgers. Not working. They still get hurt and many need major surgeries.
Don’t remember that being the case decades ago. Something has changed.
The Dodgers are #1 in all of MLB in Runs, OB%, OPS, BB, and are 2nd in HR and BA.
They are 5th in ERA, but first since April 15th.
They should also get better. If that doesn’t qualify as a Super Team, it qualifies as a Damn Good Team.
I think someday soon we’ll have a medical technology that is something like pre-injury TJ surgery. They’ll figure out a way to strengthen ligaments and tendons in people that have high stress positions on those joints, etc.
The Six-Million Dollar Man had nothing on Nolan Ryan.
The human elbow isn’t designed to throw 90+ mph sliders
Then, we will re-design it!
Exactly
Yesterday you made this comment, Bear:
” Heyward won’t be platooned, but he will sit against LHP.”
Isn’t that the definition of platooning?
In a sense yes, but since about 70 percent of the pitchers in the majors are right-handed, he will be playing a large majority of the time. Vargas on the other hand according to what Roberts said yesterday is going to split time with Taylor, so it seems like they plan on keeping Chris for the long term. Hernandez and Pages are going to play almost every day. Of course, when a lefty reliever is brought in, then Heyward will be pinch hit for, same as Outman was. I still think the bench is weak. Heyward played in 124 games last year, he won’t get that many this season. Peralta played in 133.
Let’s see if my math is correct here.
If Teoscar and Pages start every day and JHey starts against right handers and only about 30% of starters are left handed, that would mean Vargas would start about 30% of the time……..except Doc says he’ll be splitting time with CT3. So that would mean Vargas would start about 15% of the time.
Doc likes to say he wants to put his players in a position to succeed. This doesn’t sound like a situation where Vargas is set up to succeed. If all of the above facts are correct, this is failure just waiting to happen.
I agree on your math, and surely the Dodgers see this conundrum too, which makes me wonder if there’s some disagreement among the FO on what course to take regarding Vargas and CT3.
Tonight, Vargas starts in left field batting against a RHP, ..but is this just an outlier decision ..or are Doc’s words simply false posturing?
Doc also said that Outman was not in a platoon.
I immediately said otherwise, and a lot of fans lost their Shit, but here we are. Believe none of what you hear and half of what you see.
“Vargas splitting time with CT3” …yeah ..whatever they say..
De Paula has “something” about Big Papi
Once again i agree Bear! there’s nobody on that bench who gives you confidence he can take a ball the other way. Nobody who can really move a runner into scoring position. Nobody who bunts. Chris Taylor should never hit with runners on 1st and second, nobody advances on strikes! Hopefully vargas can provide some of the above. Lineup today posted yet?
Betts with day off
1) Shohei Ohtani (L) DH
2) Freddie Freeman (L) 1B
3) Will Smith (R) C
4) Teoscar Hernández (R) RF
5) Andy Pages (R) CF
6) Gavin Lux (L) 2B
7) Enrique Hernández (R) 3B
8) Miguel Vargas (R) LF
9) Miguel Rojas (R) SS
We signed the wrong Japanese pitcher!
Let’s see what they look like at the end of the season. So far, Imanaga is unhittable.
Thank god people don’t rely on small sample sizes.
Fantastic man the posts are really looking good.
Good looking posts is an interesting compliment! I’ll take it!
What does an ugly post look like to you?
Too many vowels? Poor capitalization? Cyrillic letters?
Not sure. I am just trying to follow the ultimate poster. I just want to c what it is that makes u so great!! U r so knowledgeable and your vocabulary. Thank u for helping everyone to meet your standards. U r just always teaching. Keep up the great critiques!
Ok
Imanaga has been great this year. He is 5-0 with an ERA of 0.84! And the Cubs are 8-1 in his starts, with the only loss a 2-0 game against the Braves. Imanaga signed for 4 years, $53 million and a posting fee of $9.8 million, while the Yamamoto signed for $325 million for 12 years, plus a $50 million posting fee.
While Imanaga appears to be a bargain and the Cy Young leader, it is hard to criticize the Dodgers for adding Glasnow, Yamamoto, and Paxton this offseason. All have pitched great and bolster a strong starting rotation.
Funny, but for a while I was hoping the Dodgers would get Imanaga instead of Yamamoto.
Not because I thought Imanaga was better, but it just seemed kind of gauche to spend a fortune on Yamamoto after spending a bigger fortune on Shohei. it was like, “We’re the effin’ Dodgers and you’re not!”
Now I greedily wish AF had signed all three, even though Paxton has been fine.
9:10 PM ET
Reds (19-26)
Dodgers (30-17)
SP Graham Ashcraft R
3-2 4.12 ERA
SP Walker Buehler R
0-1 7.36 ERA
Confirmed Lineup
DH S. Ohtani L
1B F. Freeman L
C Will Smith R
RF T. Hernandez R
CF Andy Pages R
2B Gavin Lux L
3B E. Hernandez R
LF M. Vargas R
SS Miguel Rojas R
64° Wind 8 mph Out
Saturday Dodger’s Minor League Schedule
4:05 p.m. PT: Great Lakes (Jerming Rosario) at Dayton (Kevin Abel)
5 p.m.: Tulsa (Justin Wrobleski) vs. Wichita (TBD)
6:30 p.m.: Rancho Cucamonga (Waylin Santana) vs. Inland Empire (Andre Sanchez)
6:37 p.m.: Oklahoma City (Landon Knack) at Sacramento (Spencer Howard)
Saturday schedule
4:05 p.m. PT: Great Lakes (Jerming Rosario) at Dayton (Kevin Abel)
5 p.m.: Tulsa (Justin Wrobleski) vs. Wichita (TBD)
6:30 p.m.: Rancho Cucamonga (Waylin Santana) vs. Inland Empire (Andre Sanchez)
6:37 p.m.: Oklahoma City (Landon Knack) at Sacramento (Spencer Howard)
Ashcraft is 1-1 against LA in his career. Given up 8 hits and 3 earned runs in 8.2 innings pitched against LA. Other than the first four in the lineup, that looks like a pretty weak group. Reds have 6 lefties hitting against Buehler.
Why isn’t Mookie playing? Are they just giving him a day of rest?
Yes
Looks like Kershaw was throwing off the mound at Dodger Stadium today. Looked like he was throwing hard and not holding back.
Well at least Vargas didn’t hurt himself tonight.
lol way to b positive!
Yikes!
Just saw the highlight of the near-collision of Pages and Vargas. That could have been bad.
Taylor later entered to replace Vargas on defense.
I’m not sure who was considered at fault, or if anyone was. Maybe Roberts just wanted to put Taylor’s body at risk.
Who is starting for the Dodgers tomorrow
My guess is Landon Knack will be brought up and start Sunday against the Reds.