To Trade or Not to Trade That is the Question
Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune of losing Trevor Bauer, Dustin May, and Clayton KershawOr to take Arms against a Sea of troubles by trading prospects for Max Scherzer or some other ilk Yes, old Billy has nothing on me. I m a poet but don t know it, yet my feet are Longfellows. OK, I ll stop right there. I wear size 15
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune of losing Trevor Bauer, Dustin May, and Clayton Kershaw
Or to take Arms against a Sea of troubles by trading prospects for Max Scherzer or some other ilk…
Yes, old Billy has nothing on me. I’m a poet but don’t know it, yet my feet are Longfellows.
OK, I’ll stop right there. I wear size 15 shoes, but if not for my prehensile toes, they would be a Size 6. 😉
However, that is the question and some of it could be answered as soon as tonight if (as anticipated) JoJo Gray can step up and show out. It would seem to me that he should get the opportunity. JoJo has the tools to be a Top-of-the-Rotation Starter and sometimes guys like this take the league by storm and other times they get pounded. You never know.
Right about now, the Dodgers need a shot in the arm. Mookie was hot and then went down with a hip injury. It turns out it has been bothering him for a while. Corey Seager is due back at any time, but we can’t expect him to immediately hit like the World Series MVP. Cody Bellinger is struggling and experiencing some bad luck, but that’s what happens. Sometimes the baseball Gods just try you.
The Dodgers lost Dustin May, have had a plethora of injuries, will possibly lose Trevor Bauer for the season and Mookie Betts is a huge question. We don’t know what his hip injury is, but it seems serious. The fact is: Hip injuries do not fix themselves. I can’t speculate what is wrong, but I just know it ain’t good. I would guess he probably got an injection, which may help for a few weeks.
Corey Knebel is on his way back and it looks like early to mid-August for him (barring setbacks) and Clayton will be back then too, but are there just too many things to overcome? No, there is not, but do the Dodgers KNOW that? My favorite saying is this:
No Mountains Can be Moved… Until you KNOW Mountains Can be Moved
The only way for the Dodgers to overcome their injuries and overtake the Giants is to change their thinking. When you change your thinking, you change your destiny.
You may think I am going all metaphysical on you… and I am because it is true. There are times when the Dodger look lost and defeated. That was apparent last night. They were behind 3-0 in the first and then Muncy and Turner hit home runs in the bottom of the inning… and then they shut down! This is not on Andrew Friedman or Dave Roberts. This is on the Collective Soul of the team. Only they can fix it. It seems like they all hit or no one hits.
Gabe Kapler is a metaphysical guy and the Giants are confident. They are believers. They KNOW mountains can be moved. I don’t have problems with Dave Roberts lineups, use of the bullpen, and all of that. It’s all subjective. Everyone has an opinion and no one has all the data and info that Doc has. But Roberts is a guy who may not understand the metaphysical side of baseball and the impact that your thoughts… the teams’ Collective Thoughts have on the game. I would say that right about now, the Giants grasp that and embrace it, while the Dodgers do not! It is that simple… and yey so hard to achieve!
Dodger News & Notes
- Steven Souza, Jr. is still playing at OKC.
- Sheldon Noisy is playing a lot of shortstop for OKC. He is being groomed to take over for CT3, in case he leaves.
- Tut Tut is still hitting .182 at OKC.
- Matt Davidson has 14 HR at OKC.
- Kaybear is biding his time, knowing that he is WAY too good to be at AAA.
- Yasiel Sierra pitched his first “clean inning” last night at OKC (2 K’s).
- OKC was the only Dodger Farm Team that played last night. If you want to know whether they won or lost… Look it up!
- Quit sayng that Bellinger doen’t change his approach with two strikes. He did last night only to hit a liner to the LF’er. Pick a new mantra!
- Victor Gonzalez looked awful last night. I think I give him a pass based upon his body of work. Let’s see his next outing.
Am I the Only One?
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Discussion (197)
Disagree, not disagreeable
Couple of points to make:
1. In David Prices’ first two outings of the year, he had a 12.00+ ERA. Since then it has been around 2.00. Cut the guy some slack as he builds up his arm strength.
2. Tony Gonsolin is HORRID, TERRIBLE, AWFUL, BAD, and DOWNRIGHT CRAPPY… and BTW has a 2.83 ERA.
FTI, you people have taken leave of your senses.
DODGERS SELECT RHP JOSIAH GRAY
LOS ANGELES – The Los Angeles Dodgers selected the contract of right-handed pitcher Josiah Gray and placed left-handed pitcher Scott Alexander on the injured list with left shoulder inflammation. In order to make room on the 40-man roster, the Dodgers designated infielder Andy Burns for assignment.
Gray, 23, was 1-1 with a 2.87 ERA (5 ER/15.2 IP) and 22 strikeouts in four games (three starts) for Triple-A Oklahoma City. In his first full season in the Dodgers organization, he was named the 2019 Branch Rickey Minor League Pitcher of the Year after going a combined 11-2 with a 2.28 ERA (33 ER/130.0 IP) with 147 strikeouts in 26 games (25 starts) between Low-A Great Lakes, High-A Rancho Cucamonga and Double-A Tulsa. In his minor league career, he is 14-5 with a 2.41 ERA in 42 games (40 starts). He was originally acquired via trade with infielder Jeter Downs from the Cincinnati Reds on December 21, 2018.
Alexander, 32, heads to the injured list for the second time this season. He appeared in the game last night, tossing 0.1 innings and allowing two hits. In 18 games this season, he is 0-2 with a 2.93 ERA (5 ER/15.1 IP) and eight strikeouts. He has been in the Major Leagues for parts of seven seasons with the Kansas City (2015-17) and Los Angeles (2018-21) and is a combined 12-9 with a 3.16 ERA (72 ER/205.0 IP) and 160 strikeouts in 211 games. The Northern California native was originally acquired by the Dodgers in a three-team trade with Kansas City Royals and Chicago White Sox on January 4, 2018.
This team has a completely different presence without Seager and Bellinger. Even without them they are still favored to win. Even with Bauer in question, Kershaw on his yearly IL rehab and Mookie questionable, Lux, and… Reks, we are still favored to beat them tonight and win the Division in two months. Most of the so called experts, and the money, still likes the Dodgers. So do I.
I knew Doc was lying yesterday when he said Mookie Betts would start today. Turns out Betts is not starting today. Why no Smith today?
Taylor
Muncy
Turner
Pujols
Pollock
Bellinger
Barnes
McKinstry
Nunez
You guys kill me. Mookie said he was fine and would be back today. So Mookie is a liar too. Everyone is a liar. You are smart and Doc is dumb! Feel better?
You should be MLB managers.
Wow, I’m still laughing at “Smart people do stupid things every day.” I mean, isn’t that exactly the opposite of what smart people do?
Could someone please explain to me how and why Vegas has the Dodgers as the favorites tonight? I mean come on….be real….just look at the pitching match ups to start with. This is always huge, I think we can all agree.
Wood vs an assortment of unproven/questionable pitchers. This has to be considered a huge advantage for SF
Hitters: look at our last 4 guys…..is there anyone who scares you….or you think scares their pitchers? Now I know the first 5 guys can go off and that may be all we need, but here is the rub for me….SF probably scores as many runs against our bullpen as they did last night against……our bullpen. We have to face Alex Wood, 8-3, and who knows our team pretty well. Advantage again has to be SF
So again I ask….how are we the favorites? Home field maybe? Means nothing in this rivalry, in my opinion. Doc is the better manager? I can’t imagine anyone giving an “amen” to that one either. So why?
In conclusion: my “gut” is telling me tomorrow morning when I wake up to check on the score, I may not be smiling. I hope my gut is wrong, but most of the time my gut (which is connected to my brain) is spot on! Nevertheless….GO LA….JUST DO IT AND SHOCK THE WORLD….or at least my gut!
Wow!!! At the pool walking and come back to this crapola…
Badger, MT, consider they’re like obscene phone callers…. No responses will kill em…
P.S. Do you think Eric worked at Guantanamo??
It’s Time for Dodger Baseball…
Anyone see the Lux reaction to the Muncy home run last night. They just showed it on the pregame show
Man that kids got some facial expressions
If there has ever been a day you haven’t done something stupid you aren’t a smart person.
So far I’m brilliant.
It’s great to see a 0 on the scoreboard going into the bottom of the first. That has to be huge for the players too, not to be down this early in the game.
Maybe the Vegas oddsmakers knew something I didn’t know.
This year is just very frustrating!! The injuries have killed us. I don’t think we can win the division with the current team as is.
We need a starting rotation not a bullpen rotation. Current we have buhler, Urias, and price. U can’t really count Gonsolin as he is just an opener. Stretch him out blah blah. He has had plenty of time to stretch out. I really don’t think LA sends an injured pitcher out there but he has something wrong when your fastball drops 5 mph in the next inning. What frustrates me is no urgency!! Price could have been in the rotation some time back.AF response has been throw some more bullpen guys out there. Our bullpen is starting to show the stress.
Our offense is basically turner and Muncy with a streaky pollock and smith hot so smith sits. The giants are going to just start walking Muncy or he will start going out of the zone. We have got to give Bellinger going to have a chance. I don’t think u can count on Betts with his injury and who knows if Seager will even come back. If he does will he have enough time to get comfortable? Btw the giant ss who replaced Crawford got a big hit. We need somebody to do that but instead reks ks 3 times. We just don’t have enough quality depth we need our starters mlp to perform.
Our defense needs to play better but I don’t know if they can. Holding runners kills us but we seem helpless to do anything about it. Without our regulars and without our regulars performing we just are a good team but not a division champ. When and if kershaw comes back how many starts until he is ready? If Bauer comes back how long would that take? We need starters and productive starters.
Here we go again. Going to have to score a lot of runs to win with our current bullpen.
Wood has never looked better!! The giant mediocre players hit homer homer homer.
That’s OK kid, if you can pitch three or four more innings and not give up a run you did great. We’re all pulling for you
Josiah Gray doesn’t look so good.
I think I’ve heard this song before. The opener will give up a run or two or three, then Gray will suck not being used to coming out of the bullpen.
The script pretty much wrote itself.
Remember that just a couple of weeks ago we swept a two game series against the Giants. Back away from the shotgun.
What a crying shame. I feel sorry for this kid although I was looking forward to his major league debut, it really shouldn’t of been in such a high leverage situation. Against the team that’s leading us in the division and a game we really needed to win
The guy Taylor was talking to what’s his name
For all you dreamers, take Bauer off your list. Even if MLB clears him he will never pitch for the Dodgers again. Can you picture the reaction if he takes the mound at Dodger Stadium! The Dodgers, their fans and the city of Los Angeles would, rightfully so, never stand for it. The history of this wonderful franchise is too valuable to jeopardize it for a yo-yo like him.
Go Dodgers!
Beaty has been hitting the ball so hard lately he is so due. Everybody on your feet. We got it baby we got it baby we got it baby Smith walks it off how sweet it is
I love LA
Smith bomb for the win.
Finally a 9th inning walkoff for Dodgers! Now the sprint starts here!
Season saving comeback!!!!!!!
Power outage at Dodger stadium, Will Smith turns off the light.