Column: Are Dodgers batters already choking? Lack of offense against Padres suggests as much
SAN DIEGO — In the aftermath of a Game 2 victory over the Dodgers that leveled the National League Division Series, San Diego Padres starter Yu Darvish complimented his former team’s offense.
Darvish mentioned how the Dodgers extended at-bats by fouling off pitch after pitch. He marveled at the restraint to not swing at pitches they couldn’t drive.
He said in Japanese, “They played typical Dodgers baseball.”
Darvish diplomatically neglected to mention another traditional element of Dodgers baseball that transformed the series.
Their hitters choked.
This is an October tradition almost as well-established as Halloween, the Dodgers cruising through the regular season, only to find foreign objects lodged in their throats when the games really count.
The best-of-five NLDS is tied at one game apiece after San Diego’s 5-3 defeat of the Dodgers, the series moving to Petco Park for Game 3 on Friday night. The loss of home-field advantage isn’t their greatest concern.
The highest-scoring team in baseball suddenly can’t score. The team with the fifth-highest run differential in the modern era suddenly can’t stand up to an unremarkable Padres bullpen.
So much for these 111-win Dodgers being choke-proof.
Remove the five runs they scored in the first 2 2/3 innings of Game 1 against Mike Clevinger and their production in this best-of-five NLDS would consist entirely of three solo home runs in Game 2. They have already struck out 19 times.
The Dodgers are struggling against an immaculate San Diego Padres bullpen that has allowed four hits and no runs over the first two games of the NLDS.
Sound familiar?
Freddie Freeman is hitting, but Mookie Betts isn’t.
Trea Turner has broken out of his career-long October slump, but Justin Turner has disappeared.
The series is now at a dangerous stage for the Dodgers, with Blake Snell scheduled to start for the Padres in Game 3 and Joe Musgrove in Game 4 on Saturday.
Snell has a 2.50 ERA in nine career starts against the Dodgers. That doesn’t count Game 6 of the 2020 World Series, a contest from which Snell was prematurely removed to set the stage for a comeback victory that led the Dodgers to their only championship under Andrew Friedman.
Musgrove registered a modest 3.63 ERA in three starts against the Dodgers this season but is coming off a win in Game 3 of a wild-card series over the New York Mets in which he pitched seven scoreless innings.
What’s perplexing about the Dodgers’ offensive troubles is that the team has managed to accomplish one of its primary objectives in each of the NLDS games, which is to get into the opposition’s bullpen early.
Clevinger, the Padres’ Game 1 starter, registered only eight outs. Darvish, who started Game 2, couldn’t record a single out in the sixth inning.
“I don’t think being kept in check by the starting pitcher is very important to them,” Darvish said. “It’s like this in regular season too. Their objective is to win, so they try to get the starter out of the game as quickly as possible and make their opponents use a lot of relievers. They do that in the regular season and win by inflicting damage little by little. I think that’s the strongest part of the Dodgers.”
But the Dodgers are scoreless in 9 1/3 innings against the Padres bullpen. They are batting just .125 against Padres relievers.
Manager Dave Roberts said of Game 2 in particular: “I thought there were a lot more good at-bats than bad at-bats, but situationally I think we could have done a better job. We had a couple opportunities to push a couple runs across, and we didn’t capitalize.”
Case in point: the sixth inning, which Darvish departed with runners on the corners and the Padres holding a 4-3 advantage.
Justin Turner struck out against Robert Suárez. Gavin Lux grounded into a double play.
The Dodgers also failed to break Suárez in the seventh inning, when a one-out double by Betts gave them runners on second and third. Trea Turner then grounded out to third, Freeman was walked intentionally to load the bases, after which Will Smith lined out to center field.
They had two men on again in the eighth inning, this time on first and second, with Cody Bellinger up. With Bellinger one for six in the series, Roberts predictably called for a pinch-hitter. The unexpected part was that he summoned Austin Barnes, the light-hitting backup catcher who batted .212 in the regular season. Barnes flied out.
Asked why he went with Barnes instead of Chris Taylor or Miguel Vargas, Roberts cited Barnes’ swing path, which made the manager like Barnes’ chances against left-hander Josh Hader. Never mind that Barnes was previously one for five in his career against Hader.
The Dodgers are batting just .229 in this series against pitchers besides Clevinger, who started Game 1 only because the Padres’ three best starters were used in the wild-card series against the New York Mets.
Dodgers opt to go with a de facto bullpen game for the pivotal Game 3 of the NLDS against the Padres, with starter Tony Gonsolin on a pitch count.
“I think going into now, if you look at it as a three-game series, I like where our offense is at,” Roberts said. “I really do.”
Roberts pointed to chances his teams created. He said he expected Betts (two for eight) and Justin Turner (one for six) to produce. He also said he didn’t think the burden of being the overwhelming favorite was weighing on his team.
“I don’t think so,” Roberts said. “I think that there’s been talk about it all year, expectations and whatever it might be. All that stuff that people might talk about before has no bearing on the outcome of a Major League Baseball game.”
Several times this year, Roberts said this Dodgers team was special. If his players don’t figure something out over the next couple of days, they will be lumped together with many of teams that came before them.
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