Hey, Didn t You Used To Be A Dodger?
With the trade deadline 20 days away, I thought it would be fun to go back over the years and see some of the names that have been acquired in season. And there are some interesting players on the list. Many familiar names have made stops in Los Angeles since 1958. The first, and only major trade in 58 during the season was a young infielder named George Anderson to
With the trade deadline 20 days away, I thought it would be fun to go back over the years and see some of the names that have been acquired in season. And there are some interesting players on the list. Many familiar names have made stops in Los Angeles since 1958. The first, and only major trade in 58 during the season was a young infielder named George Anderson to the Phillies for Gene Snyder, Jim Golden, and Rip Repulski. You might know George better by his nickname….Sparky.
In a post the other day, 2D2 told you about Chuck Essegian. Most of the important moves for the 59 season came in the winter of 58 or spring. Wally Moon came from the Cardinals for Gino Cimoli, and a SS who would make a huge impact the next few years was returned to the team from the Tigers….Maury Wills.
In the 60’s, these are some of the names the team acquired, some had decent success, others not so much. Ron Perranoski…traded for Don Zimmer. Turk Farrel, Daryl Spencer, Lee Walls, Andy Carey, Bill Skowron, who hit a homer in the 63 series against his former team, Marv Breeding, Jim Brewer, Dick Stuart, Wes Covington, Ken Boyer, Rocky Colovito. I would have loved to have seen Ken Boyer play in LA in his prime. Excellent 3rd baseman. Coolio was way over the hill when he came to the Dodgers.
The 70’s saw players like Duke Sims, Dick Dietz, Juan Marichal, and Boog Powell. Powell did not hit a single homer in his close to 50 game stint. Of course he was mostly pinch hitting. In the 70’s most of the players were home grown guys. Although they did bring back Maury Wills. Hall of Famer Hoyt Wilhelm pitched for the Dodgers in 1971 at 48 years old. His ERA in 9 games was 1.09 with 3 saves. He pitched in 16 games the following year, but was not as effective. They also had guys like Vic Davalillo come in to be pinch hitters.
For some reason, they have always seemed to get older catchers to be the backups. Chris Cannizaro was one such pickup. He was with them for a couple of years. One of their first pickups in the 80’s was Jerry Grote, a former Mets catcher. Others in the 80’s were Enos Cabell, Al Oliver, Bill Madlock, Cesar Cedeno, who I almost forgot about. Phil Garner, Rick Dempsey, Granted, some of those guys were signed in the winter but are interesting pickups to say the least.
The 90’s started off with them getting Eddie Murray. Eddie was 33 when he came to LA. Hubie Brooks came over from the Mets. Then the next year they got Gary Carter from the Mets….another old catcher. Eric Davis, Tim Wallach, Cory Snyder, Greg Gagne, Milt Thompson, Otis Nixon, Bobby Bonilla, Todd Hundley, Devon White. All those guys spent less than 3 years with the team except Wallach. I forgot in the 70’s they picked up Billy North from the A’s. He did not make much of a difference and was really not too happy to have been traded.
Guys like Kevin Elster, Chad Kreuter, Geronimo Berroa, Jim Leyritz, Marquis Grissom, Jeff Rebolet, Tim Bogar came in the early 2000’s. Brian Jordan, Fred McGriff, Rickey Henderson, Robin Ventura and Jeromy Burnitz all came over in 2003. Henderson would stick around a couple of years, but McGriff only played 86 games his only year in Dodger blue, finishing his career 7 homers short of 500.
Steve Finley came over in 2004 and hit a division clinching Grand Slam against the Giants. Jeff Kent came the next season. Some other really familiar names joined the team the next few years, Nomar, Kenny Lofton, Bill Mueller, Sandy Alomar, who was 40 when he came to LA. Luis Gonzalez, Mike Lieberthal, David Wells, Andruw Jones, who was probably the worst FA signing in Dodger history for a position player. Jason Schmidt holds that honor for pitchers. Chan Ho Park came back. Mark Loretta, Juan Castro, Brad Ausmus, Jim Thome, Jamey Carrol, Ted Lilly, another exe Dodger who came back.
There always seemed to be some player Ned Colletti felt that even at an advanced age, they could contribute something to the team. He started off the 2010’s doing the same type of pickups. Aaron Miles, Eric Thames, Mark Ellis, Shane Victorino, Bobby Abreu, Adam Kennedy, Matt Treanor, Jamey Wright, Michael Young, and in his last season as GM, Chone Figgins, and Dan Haren. Colletti also traded for Greg Maddux, not once, but twice. in 06, and 08.
The new era started when AF was hired in 2014 after the season was over. Would he continue the trend and get some senior citizen help?
Not as much as his predecessor so far. but he has gotten some. Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley, Jose Peralta, who was 39 when AF traded for him. Carlos Ruiz, another veteran catcher, Curtis Granderson, David Freese, John Axford, Ryan Madson, and Russell Martin. So he has shied away from older pitchers for the most part.
Who if anyone will AF target this deadline. One thing is obvious. The team needs a spark. Mookie Betts cannot do it all by himself. None of the pitchers on the current roster are older than 33.
I would have loved to see Thome hit at least one homer as a Dodger, but he had an injury that was bothering him, and he never got on in Blue. Of course his career continued in Minnesota, and he went over 600 for his career.
Myself, I do not see too much movement this deadline except a couple of the teams who are going to be way out of the race may want to try and get some prospects for their stars.
Discussion (108)
Disagree, not disagreeable
Today’s line up,
Joc LF
Betts RF
Bellinger DH
Turner #B
Muncy 2B
Pollock CF
Taylor SS
Rios 1B
Smith C
Gonsolin P.
per Jeff Passan
Los Angeles Dodgers reliever Joe Kelly, who was suspended for eight games for throwing at Houston Astros batters, had his ban reduced to five games on appeal, sources tell me and @kileymcd.
This lineup breaks out of the slump tonight! Or at least scores three runs! Remember this lineup is still studly compared to the Koufax Drysdale years. If only our starters would start throwing shutouts!
No team in baseball has an offensive team OPS of .800 or better. Hitting is down throughout all the teams.
I really hope Gonsolin pitches well enough tonight that it impresses Doc enough to keep him on the active roster and in the starting rotation.
Stripling’s career stats say he gives up a lot of hard hit balls and Urias career stats say he’s WAY BETTER as a reliever.
Even though Barnes got 2 hits yesterday, 1 being a lucky hit, I’m so tired of Doc playing musical catchers. Put Smith in there and leave him there for God’s sake.
Yes I know that the starting pitching and the catching are not the problems. I’m just pointing out what I believe is obvious that Doc is doing wrong. I don’t know what to say about the overall hitting, I’ll leave that to the experts.
I’ll tell you one thing Doc is doing right. He’s not reading LA Dodgertalk or else he would have resigned by now.
We are 18 games in…
Keep what little sanity you have left.
The sky is not falling.
Everything will be alright.
I still believe in this team. So does Doc. It would appear that he will keep doing what he’s done for the first 30% of this bizarre season. I have to admire his resolve. He sees no need to react. He’s not even responding really, just giving the same well rehearsed company line and putting the same guys out there. They will, or they won’t. I just hope they are playing as a team by next month.
Corey Seager is currently 2nd in MLB in barrels/plate appearance per the MLB Statcast leaderboard at 18.5%. Will Smith is 2nd on the Dodgers at 10% (25th in MLB). Muncy is 4th on the Dodgers (behind Justin Turner who’s 3rd) at 58th in MLB. Cody Bellinger is 134th in MLB at 3.9%.
In other words, Cody isn’t squaring the ball up. Muncy is striking out too much but when he makes contact he makes decent contact. Cody isn’t striking out but he’s not hitting the ball hard. In barrels/batted ball event, Cody is even worse – – he’s 157th in MLB. His swing is keeping him from hitting the ball hard.
Let’s face it – you don’t OPS .485 if you’re hitting.
I can’t get in on the action until late so I can’t read every post: so
1. Muncy broke a finger and may not be over it. It is such a fine line for a guy like muncy who is not a superstar. Give him a few days off. He is not helping as it is.
2. Bellinger is still young. He is probably feeling the pressure of an mvp season. He needs to regain some confidence and swagger. A 3 for 4 night would be a start!
3. I think stripling is more like the last outing than the first couple. Urias seems uninspiring currently. Kershaw is closer to 3 than 2. Buehler needs to get it together sooner than later. Our starters are not dominant. Other than Bueller expect quality starts which are good but not dominant.
4. Our bullpen is capable of and will have to be lockdown for us to win the series.
5. Everybody whined and cried that we need a leadoff hitter and when we get one doc won’t use him. I am just not confident that doc will ever be able to pull the right levers.
Comments about tonight’s lineup:
1) Very happy to see Joc leading off again. You always want to have your best bunter at the leadoff position.
2) In my opinion CT3 is a better defensive SS than Seager and until the entire “regular” lineup starts hitting I would make Taylor the regular shortstop and play Corey at DH, 1B or 3B, with the preference being DH or 1B. I don’t think he’s going to be an exceptionally good third baseman and I believe he has stated he doesn’t particularly enjoy playing there.
3) When you have an excellent fielding player who is not hitting (Belli), the best solution is to DH him, thereby not letting him play the field (where he is actually helping you) and giving him lots of time to stew about his failed at bats during the game. Yes, that was meant to be sarcastic. If I’m Doc, I tell Cody I’m fining him $1000 every game he doesn’t hit the ball to left or attempt a bunt at least once, no matter if successful or not. As we’ve all been saying, he needs to use the entire field and has done so before so it’s not like the idea is completely foreign to him.
4) Glad to see Catman get another start. I hope it goes so well that they can’t option him out tomorrow.
I find it ridiculous that every night there is a different strike zone.
Note to all Dodger hitters hitting with 2 strikes, which is everyone in the lineup, multiple times, PROTECT THE PLATE.
Gonsolin almost five innings eight strikeouts. Like I said before I hope he stays on the roster and in the starting rotation.
By the way, great job by Doc using Treinen this early in the game, for this situation.
Since we can’t do a damn thing offensively, it’s good we stopped them from scoring there.
Does Cody have a clue as to what to do with a bat in his hand and in the batters box? He looks so tied up in knots and can’t seem to barrel any pitch up. Doc needs to sit him down or we’ll lose him to a ruined psyche before much longer.
News on Smith. He came out of the game with neck stiffness. Ah. small ball. I love it. I was wondering if Maury is still working with the runners. Maybe Mark knows. I really like the bunt. And I wish more players were adept at that skill.
Hello offense it’s nice to see you again.
Where is McGee?
Happy now?