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By Jon Weisman
My wife has been perpetually perplexed that to her ears, I pronounce the word “ketchup” as if it were “catchup.” So with that in mind, let’s ketchup on some Dodger news …
Category: Postseason (Page 9 of 11)
By Jon Weisman
Now that Clayton Kershaw is pitching the way everyone expects him to — which is to say, completely out of this world — the slings and arrows have been reduced to one lone sling.
The postseason.
It’s a credit to Kershaw that his latest accomplishments are so par for his course that some people don’t care about any of it because of the calendar. And Kershaw would be the first to take responsibility for not having finished more postseason starts with victory in hand.
But I’ll say this. It kills me to see fans near or far toss aside eight or nine shutout innings by Kershaw as irrelevant because it’s summer and not fall.
For one thing, Kershaw’s doesn’t deserve a reputation as a playoff goat. Let’s go through this again …
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By Jon Weisman
Some pregame news and notes for you …
- Walker Buehler, the Dodgers’ No. 1 choice in the 2015 draft, will have Tommy John surgery performed Wednesday by Dr. Neal ElAttrache.
- Justin Turner will spend some time at Camelback Ranch while recovering from his leg infection, Don Mattingly told reporters today. Turner is still not expected to miss more than 15 days.
- In their past 10 games in Philadelphia, the Dodgers have allowed 13 runs, according to the Dodgers’ public relations department.
- Same source (with help from Stats, LLC): The Dodgers have an extra-base hit in 95 straight road games, tied for the second-longest streak all-time behind the 2005-07 St. Louis Cardinals (127 games).
- Tonight’s starting pitcher, newly acquired Alex Wood, has a bit of a decline in strikeouts this year. Daniel Brim of Dodgers Digest did a deep dive and may have connected the dots with some shifts in Wood’s unorthodox delivery.
- Pedro Moura of the Register has more on Wood, including this:
Over the weekend, Dodgers pitching coach Rick Honeycutt watched Wood’s first bullpen session in awe.
“Some of his changeups were almost like splits that went almost straight down,” Honeycutt said. “I said to him, ‘Geez, that’s filthy.’”
“He goes, ‘Yeah.’”
- New Dodger reliever Jim Johnson, now on his fifth team in the past two seasons, spoke to Arash Markazi of ESPN.com about the travails of changing teams.
- Despite the presence of Adrian Beltre and, of late, Justin Turner, no MLB team has gone longer without an All-Star third baseman than the Dodgers, writes Miles Wray of the Hardball Times. Pedro Guerrero was the last, in 1983.
- Newly acquired injured pitcher Bronson Arroyo could play an indirect role in the Dodger postseason, even if he never throws a pitch, as Eric Stephen of True Blue L.A. explains.
- Major League Baseball Advanced Media has make a major deal to run the NHL’s TV and online video operations, as Todd Spangler of Variety notes. How BAM, as it’s known, became such a behemoth is explored by Ben Popper at the Verge.
- Adrian Gonzalez’s three-homer, 13-base game against the Padres in April is the top offensive performance by a player this year, according to Cliff Corcoran of SI.com.
- Kiké Hernandez and Yasiel Puig took up this year’s Ice Bucket Challenge on behalf of the Dodgers this year. Don’t worry — they did it over the Dodger Stadium grass, so the water was put to use.
- Funny stuff from Jason Bateman on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” the other night (via Blue Heaven) — watch below.
Jon SooHoo/Los Angeles Dodgers
By Jon Weisman
I’m going to discuss the Dodger offense from a different direction than I typically do.
The 2015 Dodgers lead the National League in walks, home runs, on-base percentage, slugging percentage, OPS, adjusted OPS and weighted runs created.
Despite this — and understandably, I’ll concede, given how inconsistent it has been for the past month — many have criticized the Dodger offense as incapable of generating runs in the pressure cooker of October.
Among other things, Los Angeles is the worst basestealing team around, and it gets less value from its baserunning than any NL team, according to Fangraphs. A hit-and-run dynamo, the Dodgers are not.
In contrast, you don’t get very far chatting about the World Champion San Francisco Giants without hearing praise for how their ability to manufacture runs carried them to the top.
So what I wanted to look at was how the rival Giants won the 2014 World Series, against a Kansas City Royals team that was also lauded for making things happen through smart, aggressive play on its way to the American League pennant. I’ve broken down every single run of last year’s Fall Classic — seven games, 57 runs — to see how important manufacturing runs was.
The Giants won’t get extra credit for drawing a walk or bashing extra-base hits. Rather, my question today is this: Where did bunting, stolen bases, productive outs and taking the extra base on a hit play a role? (The Royals’ performance in these areas will also be noted — after all, they were within 90 feet of sending Game 7 into extra innings.)
What I found was rather diverse — games where manufacturing runs was key, games where it was irrelevant and games in between. And then there was the small matter of Madison Bumgarner having the postseason of the century.
Dodgers at A’s, 1:05 p.m.
Jimmy Rollins, SS
Andre Ethier, RF
Howie Kendrick, 2B
Scott Van Slyke, 1B
Juan Uribe, 3B
Chris Heisey, CF
Scott Schebler, LF
A.J. Ellis, C
Clayton Kershaw, P
Jimmy Rollins, SS
Andre Ethier, RF
Howie Kendrick, 2B
Scott Van Slyke, 1B
Juan Uribe, 3B
Chris Heisey, CF
Scott Schebler, LF
A.J. Ellis, C
Clayton Kershaw, P
By Jon Weisman
One day after the appearance of the spring Solis-tice, the image above shows the Dodger bench for today’s split-squad game against Oakland — the first of four Dodger games beginning between 1:05 p.m. today and 1:10 p.m. Saturday.
Here’s what’s percolating …
- Bill Shaikin of the Times had a nice scoop Thursday, reporting that on the final day of the 2015 regular season, October 4, every MLB game will start at 12 Pacific. That will heighten the drama and also reduce the competitive advantage for those teams that had later starts.
- David Huff’s Saturday start has been moved to Sunday. Huff and his wife, Lisa, had a baby boy Thursday. Ethan Thomas Allen Huff now shares the same birthday as Clayton Kershaw. Congrats to the Huffs! (By the way, happy birthday to my littlest guy, who turns 7 today!)
- Brandon League felt “free and easy” in his second consecutive day of throwing as he works his way back from right shoulder irritation, reports Ken Gurnick of MLB.com.
- Yasmani Grandal is not only working with Dodger pitchers to get to know them better, but also A.J. Ellis, writes Chad Thornburg of MLB.com. “I’ll talk to (Ellis) about guys and different things he likes to do and kind of just try to get a feel of how Dodger baseball is played.”
- How did the Alamodome become baseball-ready? Eric Stephen of True Blue L.A. uses Twitter to illustrate the process.
- From Thursday …
Jon SooHoo/Los Angeles Dodgers
Clayton Kershaw, speaking to SportsNet LA’s Alanna Rizzo today after winning his third National League Cy Young Award, on what was missing in 2014:
“Obviously, the postseason hurt. That’s something to keep me motivated. … It doesn’t feel good to fail, especially in those situations. To get to raise the trophy at the end of the year with your teammates, that’s the ultimate goal. Not to try to take away anything from Cy Young awards or anything like that, but if I were able to do that, that’d be pretty special.
“It’s the same way as last year, unfortunately. You just think about it until your next start, and it’s gonna be a while for that next one. You try to take your mind off it … but obviously it’s going to be in the back of my mind all next year, and hopefully we get in the playoffs and I go deeper.”
— Jon Weisman
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By Jon Weisman
Dodger catcher A.J. Ellis spoke to AM 570’s DodgerTalk with David Vasseigh and Kevin Kennedy for nearly 30 minutes Wednesday on a variety of subjects encompassing the 2014 season. If you click the link, the interview begins at approximately the 13-minute mark.
Though Ellis, like everyone else, realizes that ultimately the Dodgers didn’t get the job done, one subject that Ellis touched on is how much grief Clayton Kershaw received after his second playoff defeat in Game 4 of the National League Division Series, wondering how much of that grief was deserved.
By Jon Weisman
Now that Madison Bumgarner has gone full Hershiser and then some, now that the San Francisco Giants have a well-earned dynasty of three World Series titles in five years, now that history has recorded this all in fresh ink, I’ve reached the stage of acceptance with the 2014 season.
But I am left with a sincere question …
Clayton Kershaw will win the National League Cy Young Award and maybe the MVP, the Dodgers won the NL West, and all anyone will say this winter is how they are inferior to Bumgarner and the Giants. I’m not denying people the right to say it.
But if winning the World Series is all that matters, and what you do in the regular season matters not at all if you win the World Series, and if how you finish in the regular season gives no hint about whether you’re going to win the World Series, then why worry about what is happening during the regular season?
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By Jon Weisman
Lima Time.
It was the perfect antidote to sadness, the perfect break — however temporary — from gloom.
Thursday is the 10th anniversary of Jose Lima’s shutout of the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 3 of the 2004 National League Division Series — the first Dodger playoff victory in 16 years — but today seems like the right day to remember it.
By Jon Weisman
From 1989-1994, the Dodgers didn’t play in a playoff game.
From 1997-2007, the Dodgers played in four postseason series, but didn’t come close to winning any of them, losing 12 of 13 games.
It was the next year that the numbness turned to pain. After sweeps in the 2008 and 2009 National League Division Series, the Dodgers entered two winnable National League Championship Series, but gave up gut-stabbing doubles and homers that led to their demise.
Last year came the slow torture of not being able to score when the pitching was superb, leaving no room to absorb an unexpected Clayton Kershaw beating in the sixth and final NLCS game.
This year, in the NLDS, I don’t even know what to say. Never have I seen four consecutive games with backbreaking home runs after the sixth inning. I could not even imagine it.
When singles in the seventh inning by Matt Holliday and Jhonny Peralta each eluded Dee Gordon and Hanley Ramirez by inches, I still couldn’t believe it.
When Matt Adams came up as the winning run, with Kershaw on the ropes, I wouldn’t believe it.
And when Kershaw let go of that pitch, and that curveball hung in the air like a child’s balloon waiting to be cruelly punctured, I shouted “No!”
I truly believe this team deserved better.
It kills me that Kershaw will be scarlet-lettered for a postseason performance in which he tried to put the team on his back and held them up so high for so long.
That the most well-balanced offense the Dodgers have had in years would lose three games by one run and the other by two.
That a manager I respect, who isn’t perfect but who rarely gets enough credit for what he does well, couldn’t even luck into having one of many impossible decisions with the pitching staff end right.
Most of all, it kills me that fans who have been so passionate have been forced to wait another year for relief and release.
What might have been.
Thanks to everyone who has read Dodger Insider this year. We’ll be back Wednesday to kick off the offseason.
For more photos from Monday, visit LA Photog Blog.
Dodgers at Cardinals, 2:07 p.m.
Dodgers
Dee Gordon, 2B
Carl Crawford, LF
Adrian Gonzalez, 1B
Matt Kemp, RF
Hanley Ramirez, SS
Andre Ethier, CF
Juan Uribe, 3B
A.J. Ellis, C
Clayton Kershaw, P
–
Cardinals
Matt Carpenter, 3B
Randal Grichuk, RF
Matt Holliday, LF
Jhonny Peralta, SS
Matt Adams, 1B
Yadier Molina, C
Jon Jay, CF
Kolten Wong, 2B
Shelby Miller, P
Dodgers
Dee Gordon, 2B
Carl Crawford, LF
Adrian Gonzalez, 1B
Matt Kemp, RF
Hanley Ramirez, SS
Andre Ethier, CF
Juan Uribe, 3B
A.J. Ellis, C
Clayton Kershaw, P
–
Cardinals
Matt Carpenter, 3B
Randal Grichuk, RF
Matt Holliday, LF
Jhonny Peralta, SS
Matt Adams, 1B
Yadier Molina, C
Jon Jay, CF
Kolten Wong, 2B
Shelby Miller, P
By Jon Weisman
Yasiel Puig, who has a .774 OPS in the National League Division Series but has struck out in eight of his past nine at-bats, has been replaced in the Dodger starting lineup by Andre Ethier.
Ethier will bat sixth, while left fielder Carl Crawford moves up to the No. 2 spot behind Dee Gordon.
Since August 29, Ethier has made one start in a game that had meaning for the Dodgers, going 0 for 2 with a walk and a hit-by-pitch September 7 against Arizona. In his final 46 plate appearances of the regular season, Ethier went 12 for 39 with a .413 on-base percentage and .436 slugging percentage, then went 1 for 2 in Game 1 of the NLDS.
* * *
A few pieces related to starting pitcher Clayton Kershaw to pass along.
While A.J. Cassavell breaks down the risks of pitching on three days’ rest at MLB.com, Russell A. Carleton at Baseball Prospectus notes that the Cardinals do not own Clayton Kershaw.
… When we look at Kershaw’s performance against the Cardinals, we see that his BABIP is quite high at .343. I know that during the postseason everyone likes to pretend that games are won and lost based on magical fairy dust, grit, and character. But frankly, a lot of what drives a baseball game is dumb luck. That’s not comfortable for people to hear, but the sooner that you accept that, the sooner we can have a real conversation about baseball. …
Clayton Kershaw has gotten very unlucky over the last four years against the St. Louis Cardinals, and luck is not a character trait. Luck just kinda happens. If you made bets on a series of coin flips and won seven in a row, that would be an unlikely event (though possible). Yes, you still have the money you just won in your pocket, but it’s not because you have a special skill for calling coin flips or because you are a morally righteous person. You caught a run of good luck. Congrats. Don’t expect it to last. …
Jill Weisleder/Los Angeles Dodgers
Things happen that you don’t expect. Things happen that you should expect but aren’t ready for. Prepare, step up and believe.
— Jon Weisman
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By Jon Weisman
It was a delight while he lasted.
Pitching in his first game in 24 days and making an actual full-fledged start for the first time in exactly a month, Hyun-Jin Ryu shone for the Dodgers in Game 3 of the National League Division Series.
Ryu only allowed the requisite Matt Carpenter home run over his six innings of work, plus five singles and a walk, while striking out four. And he seemed to only improve after facing his biggest challenge of the ninth.
One out after Carpenter’s leadoff homer in the third, Matt Holliday singled and Jhonny Peralta worked the count to 3-1. At this point in the game, Ryu had thrown 57 pitches and only had eight outs to show for it.
But Ryu struck out Peralta on consecutive changeups, then got Matt Adams to pop out (with Hanley Ramirez making an over-the-shoulder catch in no man’s land).
Ryu needed only 15 pitches total to sail through the next two innings, then finished his night with a perfect sixth. His final 10 outs came on 37 pitches.
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By Jon Weisman
Right now, it feels like it’s the uniform. I’m not sure Mariano Rivera wouldn’t give up a home run coming out of the Dodger bullpen right now.
I don’t really believe slumps are contagious, but right now, Dodger relievers are spreading illness like a certain disease the world is beginning to reckon with. Even by the most negative appraisal of their performance in the regular season, the bullpen has been unreal in how fast it has allowed critical runs this postseason.
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In all three games of the National League Division Series, the bullpen has given up a homer before getting an out. That’s not normal, for anyone.
Tonight, in the seventh inning of Game 3, Scott Elbert used three pitches against his first three batters. Yadier Molina doubled on the first. John Jay sacrificed on the second. And Kolten Wong, while not exactly auditioning for the role of Ozzie Smith, hit his fourth career home run off a left-handed pitcher, putting St. Louis ahead to stay in a 3-1 victory.
I find my comfort in how ridiculous this has all been. Dodger relievers have allowed six runs on three home runs in 4 1/3 innings, a 12.47 ERA and 6.5 homers per nine innings which, I don’t think I’m wrong to say, is atypical. It’s not unlike Yasiel Puig’s stunning streak of seven straight strikeouts, followed by his booming triple to right that helped tie the game for the Dodgers in the sixth. Players performing at their worst don’t figure to stay at their worst.
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Dodgers at Cardinals, 6:37 p.m.
Dodgers
Dee Gordon, 2B
Yasiel Puig, CF
Adrian Gonzalez, 1B
Matt Kemp, RF
Hanley Ramirez, SS
Carl Crawford, LF
Juan Uribe, 3B
A.J. Ellis, C
Hyun-Jin Ryu, P
–
Cardinals
Matt Carpenter, 3B
Randal Grichuk, RF
Matt Holliday, LF
Jhonny Peralta, SS
Matt Adams, 1B
Yadier Molina, C
Jon Jay, CF
Kolten Wong, 2B
John Lackey, P
Dodgers
Dee Gordon, 2B
Yasiel Puig, CF
Adrian Gonzalez, 1B
Matt Kemp, RF
Hanley Ramirez, SS
Carl Crawford, LF
Juan Uribe, 3B
A.J. Ellis, C
Hyun-Jin Ryu, P
–
Cardinals
Matt Carpenter, 3B
Randal Grichuk, RF
Matt Holliday, LF
Jhonny Peralta, SS
Matt Adams, 1B
Yadier Molina, C
Jon Jay, CF
Kolten Wong, 2B
John Lackey, P
By Jon Weisman
All remaining mystery about Dan Haren’s role in the 2014 National League Division Series has been eliminated. He has been set up as tonight’s long reliever, and Clayton Kershaw has been announced by Don Mattingly as the Game 4 starter.
Nine of Haren’s 11 career relief appearances came 10 seasons ago as a newbie with the Cardinals. The 10th came 2 1/2 years ago in the 14th inning with the Angels, and he pitched a perfect inning. The 11th was in August 2013 with Washington, and he gave up a single while throwing another shutout inning.
In neither of those two recent occasions was he asked to rush into the game. So if Hyun-Jin Ryu got into any trouble early tonight in his first outing in nearly a month, you would no doubt see a short reliever in for damage control, while Haren took his time in the bullpen to get himself ready for the start of an inning.
Haren’s last competitive action came September 27, so he’s on eight days’ rest right now. He had a 2.43 ERA in his final 10 starts of the regular season with 7.6 strikeouts per nine innings and 50 baserunners in 59 1/3 innings. He had seven quality starts out of those 10.
