How Do You Spell Relief?

I think they shouldn’t part with Verdugo or Ruiz, but instead put Maeda, Ryu, or Beuhler in the BP as inning eaters… unless BearClaw is available. Then Verdugo, not Ruiz… especially with Grandal being FA in the off-season.

This will likely be the biggest issue for the club heading into the postseason. What to do with starters and relievers. Ryun wasn’t able to pitch out of the pen last year (but mccarthy sadly was) and that affected our playoff staff. Assuming good health, we could have as many as four starters into the pen in October. How wr handle that could determine our success. Obviously, Houston did it better than we did.

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Nobody wants to see fields or Baez throw a single playoff inning. Some of the other guys are more questionable [floro. Hudson, etc.]. Jansen and Alexander are in and then there are the inevitable deadline additions.

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How will Robert’s and the front office manage the staff heading into the postseason? Big decisions will have to be made and starters will have to be unselfish [like maeda] and take one for the team. If wood or hill turns into a dominant short relief arm like Kenya did last year we could be in luck. We still need to add at least one more durable arm that can be counted on to pitch every day come October.

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I dont think there is that much in the minors that can help us. Maybe sborz or Hernandez but I’m not expecting much.

.300/.408/.555

21db/3tp/15hr

48bb/71k

40g @ 1b

37g @ 3b

Previous experience in OF

Bats rh throws rh

How long before we see connor joe in blue?

FanGraphs on the team’s 24 YO Righty:

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Tony Gonsolin, RHP, Los Angeles NL (Profile)

Gonsolin debuted among the Five last week following a series of increasingly impressive starts that culminated in an 11-strikeout effort against just 20 batters on July 10th. While he failed to overwhelm his opponents so decisively in his lone appearance over the past week, his July 16th start was notable for another reason — namely, that it occurred against the Arkansas Travelers of the Texas League and represented the right-hander’s debut at Double-A.

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The former ninth-round pick was still quite strong, recording an 8:0 strikeout-to-walk ratio against 26 batters over 6.0 innings (box). ONe account indicates that Gonsolin touched 98 mph, as well, which is roughly in line with previous reports.

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Gonsolin’s slider is naturally effective against same-handed batters, but he appeared to have some strategies for dealing with lefties, as well.

ROLAIDS

The below is from: https://dodgerblue.com/dodgers-manny-machado-trade-analysis-right-move/2018/07/19/?utm_source=Dodgers+Subscribers&utm_campaign=dd8c6ad05c-The+DB+Report+04-2016&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_5603c26edc-dd8c6ad05c-204389565

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Matt Kemp deserved his start in the 2018 All-Star game, but age might finally be starting to catch up with him. Over his last 25 games, Kemp is hitting .232 with a .655 OPS. Take out a couple big games in the beginning of July and he’s 11 for his last 73.

So JT didn’t start any of the last three games of the first half, had a four day respite with the break and isn’t starting game 1 of the second half. Should we be worried? Why not a ten day DL and keep Foles up?

Mlb.tv is free this weekend.

I haven’t thought about this a lot, but I was just thinking that with the acquisition of Manny, the Dodgers have quite a bit of extra base hit power following Chris Taylor. I know it isn’t easy to make changes mid-season, but if he can do it, it might behoove Taylor to change his approach and make a concerted effort to cut his strikeouts and better utilize his speed by getting on base more. Again, that sort of adjustment is probably very difficult to achieve mid-season, but if together with Turner Ward, he can pull it off, I think it would make the Dodgers all that much more dangerous. And if Manny then signed on long term with the Dodgers, and Cory Seager returns fully healthy next year, Taylor would become even more valuable next year.

Typical runners left on base so far. But if Rich Hill can keep this up, I think we’ll get a big hit for him and break this game open.

Watching Rich Hill is like watching an Artist at work.

Machado is a STUD

The Dodgers have Machado. The second half starts tonight with the first of a 3 game series with Milwaukee than Philadelphia for 3, Atlanta for 4, and Milwaukee again for 4, and then Houston for 3. All very good teams, let’s see what happens.

Mark, I don’t like your lineup, but I don’t like mine either.

Why in the world are they sending Grandal with no outs?

Is that elvira behind home plate?

Name a better hitter in the national league than machado. Arenado?

Very very very happy with CT3’s base hit there to bring Utley in. Man if he wakes up this is going to be a fun next few months!!

Bases loaded, 1 out. 2 pop ups. Great clutch hitting.

I thought Grandal going home was not very smart if there was any question that he would score. It would have been 2nd and 3rd with no outs, and the top of the order coming up. I believe in being aggressive, but there are times that that it can be ill advised.

Btw. That defensive play by keekay was all world. Exactly what your supposed to do in that situation. Run at the runner. So many would throw.

Are we thinking floro or Hudson in the 8th?

Here is a post from earlier today that I put up right before comments closed:

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Here’s an excerpt from an article in the NY Post about today’s baseball:

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“To that end, June 24 may have provided the most telling game and broadcast of the season, if not the era. It was the clincher, the one containing indisputable evidence that The Game has lost its heart, soul, good senses and mind.

On SNY, Ron Darling watched the Mets play more fundamentally bereft and bullpen-senseless losing baseball, an 11-inning game of modern home-run-or-whiff ball against the home-run-or-whiff Dodgers. With both teams pulling effective relievers as if they’d arrived at their one-station stops, 14 pitchers appeared.

Darling: “It seems teams now try to win games through some math algorithms in real time, when the game is calling for you to do something to win the ballgame.”

Or, as the long-ago radio comic Fred Allen said, “The only thing I know about algebra is that X equals my old man’s signature.”

And it was Darling who last season said what logical fans have for years been saying to one another: “They pay the big money to the starters, then expect the relievers to win the games.”

June 24’s game presented final, indisputable evidence of a game in needless free fall. In the bottom of the 10th, the Mets had a runner on first, no out. Next, even against a radical shift, Dominic Smith, 11th overall pick in the 2013 draft, didn’t try to bunt the runner over, perhaps even for a hit. Instead, he struck out on three pitches.

Afterward, Mickey Callaway offered both a stunning — or was it? — explanation and indictment: Smith had “never bunted in his professional career.”

At the All-Star break, the Yankees have proven that a team can be competitive playing one-trick, home-run-or-whiff ball because most everyone else does, except with fewer, less-expensive sluggers in mostly larger parks.

At the break, the Yanks had 821 hits. But as MLB concludes its likely first-ever season with more strikeouts than hits, the Yanks had 866 strikeouts. Consider: The 1978 World Series champion Yanks finished the regular season with 100 wins and only 695 K’s.

Modern slugger/superstar Aaron Judge, in roughly two full seasons, has struck out 382 times. In 13 seasons Joe DiMaggio struck out 369 times. In 18 seasons, Yogi Berra never struck out more than 38 times.

And Bryce Harper, this season with 102 strikeouts and 70 hits — and a career disinclination to run to first base — is the new standard in must-get, mega-millions superstardom.

But we’re not going to abandon the game we love. With all the millions spent for fourth and fifth starters and .235 batters, money should not preclude the cure. Thus we propose:

MLB teams’ Directors of Bunting, Shift-Defeating and Opposite Field Hitting. That could cause a significant swing in wins over losses, no?

From there, who knows? Directors of Running To First Base (with video case-studies of why it’s important). Catching With Both Hands coaches. Directors of Allowing Effective Relievers to Pitch a Second Inning. Instructors of Base Runners Noting Where Outfielders Are Positioned.”

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I couldn’t agree more.

7/31 bobblehead night for Alex wood. Cross him off the potential list. Mark 😉

Dave larussa

Who needs Manny Machado? We’ve got Kike’.