By Jon Weisman
Tonight’s starting pitcher, Julio Urías, has thrown 58 professional innings this season. Dave Roberts said Thursday that the plan was to give Urias two more starts, then evaluate.
Most interpreted this as Roberts saying that Urías would be shut down in the manner of Ross Stripling, who hasn’t pitched in a game since May. To be clear, though, that wasn’t stated explicitly by Roberts, who simply said, “we’ll go from there.”
Last year, Urías threw 80 1/3, and the year before, a career-high 87 2/3. Even in the unlikely event of two complete games, Urías would still be at 76 innings on the year. Two six-inning outings would put Urías at 70. Presumably, Urías can go incrementally above the 80-plus inning range that he has previously reached.
So the question would be whether it makes sense to use all those innings now, while the Dodgers wait for the return of Brandon McCarthy, Hyun-Jin Ryu and Alex Wood from the disabled list (and longer down the road, Brett Anderson). Or do they have Urías take the break, and the ramp him up again in the second half of the season, when the rotation might be more crowded — not that there couldn’t be other setbacks.
