Sure, you never like to have three errors, but that’s not what lost the game for the Dodgers. They didn’t hit. That’s why they lost – pure and simple. It’s not time to panic on Outman, Lux, Kike, and CT3… but what is up? Pages and Vargas are packing their bags at OKC… maybe Sweeney too.
I have to get out of here soon as I am headed to Cleveland Clinic today for an appointment tomorrow to see if I can get my A-Fib fixed. I am staying at the Intercontinental Hotel in Cleveland, which is connected to the Clinic. It’s a very nice hotel. I am going to Cleveland Clinic because they are continually rated the #1 heart hospital in the USA.
I will probably post from there, but there are no guarantees. The Dodgers play the Twins tomorrow. Still, the conditions of yesterday’s game were deplorable, but no excuses! It was nice to see Michael Busch hit yesterday. After 27 ABs, he is hitting .296 with a .856 OPS. Most importantly, he has struck out just 7 times. Outman has 13 K’s in 32 ABs. They are pitching him inside, then away, then high and in, and he’s falling for it every time. He has a 41% K Rate! His platoon mate (Kike) is about as bad and CT3 is worse. I mean could Drew Avans do any worse? I think this will pass. I hope this will pass. I pray this will pass!
Austin Barnes leads the team in hitting (.500) and Rojas is hitting .313. The Dodgers hitting staff are working with Taylor Trammell – we may see him today in LF or RF. Boy, this bottom of the lineup really sucks right about now.
Yet, as bad as we think the team is, MLB has a new #1 in the Power Rankings:
1) Dodgers (previously: 2). Ten days in, and Mookie Betts leads baseball in essentially every major statistical category: Hits, runs, home runs … even walks. It’s that last one that’s particularly impressive, all told, considering the guy who is hitting behind him in that lineup: It’s not like there’s any particular advantage to pitching around Betts. Speaking of Shohei Ohtani, he’s “only” putting up a .944 OPS, which would have been top 25 in baseball last year but currently puts him only third on his own team.
— MLB.COM
OKC Baseball Club
- Drew Pomeranz got the win and was consistently hitting 93 MPH, which is good for him. How long before he comes to a Ravine near you?
- Andy Pages was 3-5 with 2 RBI and a HR
- Trey Sweeney was 3-3 with 2 BB
- Miguel Vargas was 1-3 with 2 BB and 2 RBI
- Ryan Ward was 3-5 with 4 RBI and a HR
Tulsa Drillers
- Tulsa won 12-9 with Ryan Sublette going two scoreless, hitless, walkless innings (2 K)
- Dalton Rushing had two hits, including a double, as did Jose Ramos (HR too), Brandon Lewis, and Austin Beck (3-Run HR).
- Brendon Davis had three hits (including a HR), and Lolo Sanchez had four.
Great Lakes Loons
- Great Lakes was One-Hit in a 2-0 loss.
- Kyle Nevin got the lone hit.
- Peter Huebeck went 3.2 Innings, allowing one run on two hits as he struck our five and walked three.
- Move on – nothing to see here.
Rancho Cucamonga Quakes
- They won by a touchdown – 14-7
- DePaula led off and was 1-6 with a RBI and 2 Runs scored.
- Hope stayed hot and was 2-5 with 2 HR, 4 RBI, a BB, and 3 runs scored. Move him to GL already!
- Gelof was 1-4 with 3 RBI
- Reynaldo Yean went 1 Inning, allowed 1 H, 0 Runs, 1 BB and struct out 2.
I probably won’t continue to post all the scores and highlights daily, but it has been fun the first week. There are lots of sites that give you game recaps and minor league stuff, but I try to give you stuff you don’t get elsewhere. It’s going to be a fun season
Discussion (20)
Disagree, not disagreeable
Waaay too early to worry about Outman.
His BABIP is .200 , which shows he’s hit into some bad luck. By contrast, six other regulars have a BABIP of .382 or higher.
Hitting a homer really helps the Batting Average on Balls in Play…because it winds up out of play, in the bleachers.
As for Lux, his BABIP is a lowly .231, so perhaps some bad luck too.
But Lux doesn’t merit as long a runway as Outman. In the next few weeks, he needs to start hitting enough to show why he, and not Rojas, should be a regular.
The alternatives to Outman are hitting much worse than he is. While Outman’s OPS is a sorry .512, Kike’s is at .390 and Taylor’s at .267.
All four of these guys should improve, and Heyward should too, assuming his back gets better.
But if they don’t, Vargas and Pages should be ready to step up.
04/08/24 Los Angeles Dodgers activated RHP Connor Brogdon.
04/08/24 Los Angeles Dodgers sent RHP Dinelson Lamet outright to Oklahoma City Baseball Club.
04/08/24 Los Angeles Dodgers optioned RHP Gus Varland to Oklahoma City Baseball Club.
Phillips brought some heat with him tonight.
Really like watching Hudson pitch, glad the FO let him come back.
James Outman needed that!
Another AB for Mookie, another called strike WAY out-of-the-zone
..beyond tiresome
That strike three call on mookie was criminal.
Came across this on Twitter/X. I thought it was interesting.
https://x.com/GessnerJosh/status/1777385204870488571
David Vassegh
@THEREAL_DV
Shohei Ohtani held a press conference to answer questions. He said after his first 2 AB yesterday he swung a cricket bat to help his swing. #Dodgers #Ohtani
NO Dodgers Minor League games scheduled today. Play resumes Tuesday.
7:40 PM ET
Dodgers (8-4)
Twins (3-4)
SP James Paxton L
1-0 .00 ERA
SP Bailey Ober R
0-1 54.00 ERA
Confirmed Lineup
SS Mookie Betts R
DH S. Ohtani L
1B F. Freeman L
C Will Smith R
3B Max Muncy L
RF T. Hernandez R
2B Gavin Lux L
CF James Outman L
LF T. Trammell L
49° Wind 10 mph Out
100per cent eclipse in southern Illinois
Plus Venus n Jupiter visible
Hey Mark, did you go outside in Indi to witness this total eclipse? Looked cool on tv.
We had 60% coverage in LA, which didn’t impact sunlight whatsoever here.
Hope your exam goes well tomorrow Mark. Will have you in our prayers.
Way too early to judge how any of these players will do the rest of the way. Granted, it does not look too good right now. Outman has also scorched some balls that have been caught. Law of averages should catch up at some point. Not sure what is the problem with CT-3. He has never had this bad of a beginning to a season. I am heading home on Thursday morning. Looking forward to that. Good luck on the heart exam Mark. Hope it all turns out well.
Houston Mitchell nailed it:
“Hi, and welcome to another edition of Dodgers Dugout. My name is Houston Mitchell and is it too early to end the season, award the division to the Dodgers and start the postseason?
My apologies for no newsletters last week. I had some sort of bad cold that made my writing more gibberishy than usual, so I thought I’d spare you the more incoherent ramblings than usual from me.
So here we are, 12 games into the season, and the Dodgers already have the biggest division lead in baseball and are the only team in the NL West above .500. They scored at least four runs in every game until Sunday’s loss.
Now that I’ve written that, they will probably go in a slump, go 4-8 and score 16 runs in 12 games.
Before we get too carried away by this offense, keep in mind that it is unlikely that Mookie Betts hits .386 this season or that Will Smith hits .415. Some of these guys are bound to cool off. And when the top part of the lineup cools off, will the bottom half heat up?
Let’s break down the Dodgers lineup by batting order position:
Batting 1-2: .356/.447/.701
Batting 3-5: .337/.418/.509
Batting 6-9: .180/.244/.246
The bottom four in the lineup are hitting like having four pitchers batting.
Some other random thoughts:
—When is it officially time to worry about James Outman? He is four for 32 this season. In his last 34 games, dating to last season, he is hitting .195/.299/.373 with 42 strikeouts in 118 at-bats. Too early to give up, but definitely something to watch.
—And what about Chris Taylor? He is one for 21 this season. He hasn’t looked like Chris Taylor since 2021. That’s not a slump, that’s a new normal.
—Austin Barnes is hitting .500 this season, which shows what people mean when they say don’t judge anyone based on a small sample size. Former Dodger Dave Anderson was a career .242 hitter. But in 1990, he hit .350. Sounds impressive, but it was only in 100 at-bats. Which is why you always have to look deeper into almost every stat.
—Who’s the doofus who wrote that moving Betts to shortstop might be too much for his all-around game? Oh yeah, that was me. Still have concerns it might wear him down at the end of the season, but for now, never mind.
—The infield defense does continue to be a glaring weakness though. Those are the types of things that can kill you in a postseason series.
—For those of you keeping score at home, that’s Miguel Rojas with two home runs, Freddie Freeman and Will Smith with one combined. Early-season baseball stats are so fun.
—It looks like Yoshinobu Yamamoto has adjusted just fine to the majors. In his last 10 innings: Five hits, no runs, two walks, 13 strikeouts. His breaking stuff looks like he’s in a video game.
—And how come Yamamoto’s interpreter gets no press? Shohei Ohtani‘s gets all the notice. Yamamoto’s is named Yoshihiro Sonoda and he won the Dodgers’ buffalo wings eating contest in spring training. He really needs to up his game and get into some sort of scandal though. He’s never going to get noticed at this rate.
—Now it’s time to worry about Gavin Stone. When you are the No. 5 starter, you can’t afford too many poor performances, or you are no longer the No. 5 starter for the Dodgers, you are the No. 1 starter in the minors.
—Did you see Ohtani’s first home run? When he connects with the ball, it sounds different than it did for almost every other Dodger in history. The sound is just perfect. We have a spot online where you will be able to watch every home run Ohtani hits this season. You can see it here.
—Emails still come in wondering when the Dodgers will get a closer. They have one already: Evan Phillips. There are bigger problems to address than Phillips.
—The Dodgers are on pace for 108 wins. But it’s the 11 wins they need after that that count the most.
Another PR blunder
Ohtani hits his first home run, which should lead to a joyous celebration for the team, Ohtani, and the person who caught the ball. But leave it to the Dodgers to foul it up. They just can’t get out of their own way sometimes. For every good thing they do, such as renewing Andrew Toles’ contract, they fumble something else. Here are the basics of what happened (for a full account, read Bill Plaschke’s great column here.)
Ohtani homers into the right-field pavilion. The ball heads right for Ambar Roman and her husband, Alexis Valenzuela.
“We could see it coming right toward us, and everyone around us was rushing for it,” Roman said.
The ball bounced off several hands and landed at their feet. Roman leaned over and picked it up.
“I’m on the ground and I hear my girl screaming and I look up and she has the ball,” Valenzuela said. “It was indescribable.”
Before they even get their bearings, they are surrounded by security guards and brought underneath the stands. The two are separated and Roman is “asked” to surrender the ball for two baseball caps. Her husband is kept about 20 feet away, and security won’t allow him to talk to his wife to discuss the offer. She is told if she decides to keep the ball (which one auction house later said could have been worth $100,000), that the Dodgers won’t authenticate it, making it potentially valueless with no official way to prove it is actually the Ohtani home run ball.
Still separated from her husband, Roman eventually negotiates exchanging the ball for an Ohtani-signed bat, signed ball and two signed caps.
The Dodgers promise to escort them to their car since they now have four signed Ohtani items that could be the target of a thief. However, they end up not escorting them.
Said Valenzuela: “It was such a big moment. What happened kind of stains it.”
Said Roman: “It’s done now, and I’m not mad, I’ll still be the same fan. But they shouldn’t have been so pressuring.”
So, really Dodgers? Using strong arm tactics to pressure two fans who are in the middle of what should have been a great moment? Trying to negotiate a good deal with the fans, sure, I can understand that to a point.
But to separate the two, and not even let them talk to each other? Unforgivable. You’re running a fan-oriented business, you’re not a part of Don Corleone’s family business. And perhaps worst of all was the blackmail threat to not authenticate a ball that was clearly historic. Reprehensible.
Really, really disturbing behavior.
“I’m telling them, ‘I’m with her, that’s my wife, it’s my wife, we’re in this together,’ but they kept like 20 to 30 feet between us,” said Valenzuela. “If I was in there, we could have talked about it.”
Said Roman: “It was just me and my thoughts. I do wish I could have talked to my husband.”
After Plaschke talked to the Dodgers for his column, they suddenly grew a conscience. They talked to the couple and arranged for them to return for another game during which they will receive more valuable authenticated memorabilia. The Dodgers also said they’re going to review their procedures involving fans who catch milestone balls.
“We’re excited to host them again for a special night and give them a special Dodger experience,” said Lon Rosen, the Dodgers’ executive vice president and chief marketing officer. “And we’re going to review the process.”
The other controversy that night is that many interpreted Ohtani’s comments, including our own Dylan Hernández, who is fluent in Japanese, to say that he met with the couple. He didn’t. While most of the Japanese speakers in attendance also thought he meant he had spoken to Roman directly, he never used the word “I,” so perhaps he was talking about the Dodgers’ security team.
Just another bad look for Ohtani, but that was nothing compared to what Roman and Valenzuela went through.
You have to figure that someone near the top of the Dodgers’ food chain has to look at the many miscues the last few years in this area and ask him or herself “What are we doing wrong here?”
Because that couple deserved better. And you have to wonder what will happen to you if ever in a similar situation.
Good luck on your procedure.
I read an article a month ago where Taylor said he had reworked his swing so he could make more contact. It all looks basically the same.
It’s getting late early for Lux, Outman and Taylor.
I think we may have seen the best of Outman last year. I’ve never been completely sold on him. To me, he’s a lighter version of Joc Peterson. He can really look lost at the plate. Wouldn’t surprise me at all if there is someone else in the lineup come May.
hope everything goes well. Mark!! the bottom is bad! the weather,conditions, and umpires were just horrible. no heart yesterday. lucky nobody got hurt either team yesterday. start over today and get a win! go barnes!!
Good luck with your medical appointment, MT! Good info as usual and yes to what is plainly obvious to all……roster adjustments are going to have to be made to improve the bottom of the order! Yes, it’s early but it can get late very quickly!!! Would AF dfa CT3 and eat the contract? I’d say that’s getting REAL close to fruition!!
VIVA AZUL!!!