The Dodgers are back in a familiar but ugly spot: looking for a way to stop a seven-game skid, and hoping Yoshinobu Yamamoto can be the one to steady things on Saturday.
That losing streak has been built on a strange mix of problems. The pitching hasn’t been the main issue, not by a long shot.
Yamamoto was sharp last Saturday against the Boston Red Sox, giving up three runs over eight innings, but the Dodgers only managed two runs. On Friday night in Arizona, Roki Sasaki allowed two runs in six innings and Los Angeles still grabbed a lead in the eighth before Edwin Díaz’s slider turned it into another loss.
The defeat on Tuesday at Wrigley Field got messy later, but it was still another solid start wasted after Tarik Skubal held the Dodgers to two runs in six innings in his Dodgers debut.
That’s been the frustrating pattern: the Dodgers keep getting quality work from their starters and keep ending up on the wrong side anyway. Major league teams are 803-358 (.692) this season when their pitcher turns in a quality start, and the Dodgers have piled up 61 of them, most in the majors by 11. That total even leaves out the six hitless, scoreless innings Eric Lauer supplied in bulk relief after an opener on June 22.
Normally, that kind of starting pitching would put a team in a great position. The Dodgers are 44-17 (.721) when they get a quality start. But during this seven-game slide, they’ve lost three such games in the last week alone.
The bigger problem has been the bats. The slump has stretched back into July, when the Dodgers were outscored for just the third time in nine years. Through the end of June, they were rolling at 5.36 runs per game, the best mark in the majors, while hitting .266/.347/.443 with a 118 wRC+, also tops in the league across batting average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage and wRC+.
Since July 1, though, the offense has dropped into the bottom half of the league. The power has thinned out too.
The Dodgers are tied for 20th in home runs since the start of July with 32, and only nine of those have come from outfielders. That group has hit just .225/.310/.346 with an 84 wRC+ over the last 30 games.
There has been one odd bright spot: the Dodgers have actually handled runners in scoring position well during the losing streak, batting .273/.333/.500 with a 125 wRC+. The catch is that they haven’t had nearly enough of those chances.
They’ve come to the plate just 48 times with runners in scoring position during the seven-game skid, fourth-fewest in the majors and a little under seven plate appearances per game. Over the last eight days, MLB teams as a whole have averaged more than 68 plate appearances in those spots.
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Dodgers Fans Just Sent A Loud Message About SportsNet LA
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SportsNet LA has steadily evolved since the channel launched, reshaping its broadcast team along the way and adding fresh elements to its set at Dodger Stadium. The latest ratings bump suggests Dodgers viewers are still willing to stay close to home for their coverage, even when a national outlet is carrying the same game. What makes that even more interesting is how much the networks identity has changed and how much attention this game might bring to the next step in its broadcast push. [Read more 🡒]
Dodgers Prospect Kendall George Now Faces A Bigger Question After Freak Injury
Kendall Georges season took a strange turn at Double-A Tulsa when the Dodgers prospect collided with the Drillers bat dog, an odd play that wound up sidelining one of the organizations quickest players. George, who has built his reputation in the Dodgers minor league system on speed and base-stealing ability, was briefly able to return before landing back on the injured list, leaving the setback hanging over what had been a promising year.
The bigger issue now is less about the unusual way the injury happened and more about how long it will take George to get right again. He let the news out on Instagram, and for a player whose value is tied so closely to burst and movement, any knee trouble creates real uncertainty about when he can get back to impacting games the way he usually does. [Read more 🡒]