Is anyone else annoyed that they did not go back to the wreckage in Penny's boat to look for survivors?

Honey We Shrunk Our Offense

Kershaw Forever

(yes, I googled "worst threequels")

Hopefully, Chad will have a nice showing from his friends and family.

Did Lapidus remember what his heading was before he crashed?

And it means that I may have to seriously consider going to San Diego next Tuesday.

(Okay, sorry, I realize Jon didn't ask for further suggestions.)

Elbert 1 inning, 1 K, 1 BB, no hits. Welcome back Scott!

"Basically, he just took a stand," Rockies manager Clint Hurdle said. "He wasn't going to get pushed around, plain and simple. I think if you've played this game for a while, if somebody pushes you in front of 38,000 people, I think he acted pretty appropriately..."

I may find myself in the minority here, but this kind of thinking drives me insane. They both made mistakes. Kemp should not have pushed him the way he did, and he has said so, but why is it "okay" for Torrealba to respond that way just because it is in front of a crowd? What about being the mature person and just walking away?

There was no real time line given to us...a day on the raft? But given Sun's loss, wouldn't you at least try to head that way to see if anyone is floating on some wreckage?

Dodger 2B in 1990 (Juan Samuel + 2 PA of Lenny Harris) had an 0 for 32 stretch in June.

Eric Karros had an 0 for 27 in 1996 and was the only man at 1B during his futile streak.

Right after the Piazza trade in 1998, Dodger catchers (all but one PA was Charles Johnson) had an 0 for 26 slide.

"stretch run"
"serious run at winning the Division"

... Thanks for giving me the biggest laugh I've had in about a week. It has been a dreary day at work thus far, and I needed it.

I think the Dodgers better worry about being overtaken by the Giants before anything else.

No point going to the island when they saw it disappear anyway. The Island won't let Aaron die, as is my assumption.

"I am no Pierre supporter, but how can you say with a straight face that the Dodgers' problems exist, in part, because we don't have Cody Ross? Jayson Werth, on the other hand... "

This may not have anything to do with my original post mentioning Ross and his 10HR to go with Werth's 9. But that comment wasn't meant as wishing Ross was still around (tho there apparently are worse things). It was meant as "wouldn't you know it" about the two and their measly 19HR. vs. the power-challenged Dodgers team total of 39. ;)

And "Ross'.202 BA probably would be the focus for some folks" should be read as folks like Ned, who'd probably only look at BA, ignorning any and everything else.
What's done is done. They're no longer Dodgers.

As for the decisions leading to their no longer being Dodgers, or any others Ned has made--it seems to me that for a team to be consistently excellent, the GM has to be really good and/or really lucky, then after a while just really good.

You can make a pretty fair case so far that Ned is neither.

There might be one good recent sign that he's learning: his telling Tony J. that he was close to acquiring a backup infielder. But he hadn't already decided it should be Lucille II. Yet it's quite possible that'll be his solution...surely not...

You do realize the Dodgers will be 2.5 games out of first if they win today and Arizona loses, right? Just checking.

Thanks for the good cheer!

I understand your feelings on it, but that is where I disagree. For me what is expected is different than what is correct. I know this is all subjective, but Torrealba in my eyes is accountable for his decision to not let it go. Of course, we live in a society that generally thinks he had to respond the way he did. I am arguing that there could be a different expectation in our culture.

Of course, this probably means I gave Ned too much credit for not calling up Lucille II immediately. It's likely he would have.

At this point, you have to be open for anything to happen -- Walt being the island savior, Locke coming back to life, Aaron being a super-baby, Jin being alive and in the care of Desmond, Ben being a good guy in the end, whatever. The show has a history of keeping its viewers in the dark.

Was that on a fastball?

Confarnit.

... You were saying? Something about winning today?

He'd be fine without a 3rd pitch if he could spot the other 2. The fastball and curve are that good. But, he still doesnt have that kind of control yet. Thats fine for AA, but not in the majors.

If he had just struck out we'd be in pretty good shape.

12 consecutive innings without a run!

http://www.bb-ref.com/pi/shareit/VPBJ

I only see it on Gameday.

I hate sitting here all game with a manageable deficit not doing a thing about it, come on offense!

?

I'm so glad Florida made the right move extending his contract. Can't speak to any 11 year olds...

Oh hey, it happened!! Ha!!!

Yeah, it was a little nubber over the itchers head. It was pretty pathetic.

13 consecutive innings without a run.

I need my pFX!

I sent my son's defective bat back to Easton and they said they would replace it but his model (a 2008) is on back order and can't be shipped for at least 2 wks. Rather than making him wait, they're sending him a brand new upgraded 2009 model, a bat now worth twice as much as the one I bought him 9 months ago. They were very nice.

But I also left to do some work while keeping an eye on the game, and because I frankly didn't feel like being caught up in a small vortex of negativity here. Hard not to be when the offense is so woeful these days, mind you.

Ah well. Another meeting coming up soon will mean I'll miss the end of this game, so I wish I could bequeath Eric S some Vin Scully for those missing innings but alas I do not have the power.

It's still early but it doesn't look like a wilcard team will come from the NL West this year. The whole division is playing horrible right now.

He needs big nights from Edinson Volquez and Josh Hamilton!

I think he just needs more coffee today.

I suppose the same applies to the Dodgers offense, alas.

POW!!!

14 consecutive innings without a run.

Are half of his starts so far day games?

Actually, he sounds like his effervescent self today. He always makes a few goofs in the early innings. He hits his stride after he's no longer responsible for a simulcast.

Then they allow him to throw 100+ pitches in his first start, close to that in his second and now this game.

That seems to offset the value of limited inning, and venture into dangerous territory.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/06/04/lighthouse.found.ap/index.html

I think the danger for a young pitcher is that he throws too many pitches too often, not that he throws a normal number of pitches with solid rest.

Kershaw's turn was skipped once or twice in the weeks before he was called up - it's not as if they had him on ice.

It has nothing to do with wanting him to do bad, I just thought that would be our best chance to score. Isn't that the whole idea?

I'm no expert...I did however stay at a Holiday Inn last night.

1 flyout
1 line-drive out
1 home run
4 walks

I dont think I ever had a school year that lasted past June 1st.

... Well, other than the part about the bad baseball team out there on the field, yeah.

That is why they don't schedule that many of them.

They have only 2 more scheduled, later this month against the White Sox and another in August against the Rockies.

its just that he had a hit in the top 9th with no one on last night, and today he leads off with a hit in front of guys like hu and maza, after GIDP with Russell on base..

my point is it just hasn't been clutch, starting with those two close misses in chicago with the bases loaded, those were heartbreaking

Spilborghs was 10-28 vs LHP this year.
.357/.471/.607

His career vs LHP in 179 ABs
.341/.408/.525

Call him Olmedo Saenzborghs.

The last pitcher to do that:

Buddy Carlyle!

15 consecutive innings without a run.

That notice was late but, going to the 6th... let's GET SOME RUNS!!! :-)

I have 16 because I didn't count the 9th inning from Monday's game. Since only the top half was played, I used only the 8th inning as the starting point, then the 1st inning of Tuesday's game.

I am beginning to think that the young Chan Ho Park some how figured out the delicacies of time travel and has joined the 2008 Dodgers directly from 1997 (or possibly 2000)

But we need offense badly!
surprising--Hu will take it!

15 I meant... I had 15... Nice sacrifice by Park!

Geez, I think I'm going senile myself.

Perhaps our Management thinks that sac bunting is a good thing, and that we didn't give anything up in the process...

39 at-bats, Tampa Bay CF (Dukes, Baldelli, Upton), May 4-15.
35, Atlanta LF (Diaz, Langerhans), April 15-24.
35, Yankees DH (Matsui, Posada, Giambi, Damon, Duncan), September 15-26.
31, Baltimore C (Bako, Hernandez, House) August 18-28.
31, Toronto 3B (Glaus, Luna), July 31-August 11.
30, Anaheim 3B (Figgins, Izturis), May 13-20.
30, Colorado 2B (Carroll, Barmes, Quintanilla) April 21-May 1.

I think this constitutes hitting for the cycle if you're a Dodger.

In fair territory...?

Is this some sort of machine that makes you play for a corrupt Italian soccer team?

https://dodgerthoughts.baseballtoaster.com/archives/10805.html

"Basically, for an entire game, as I feared and yet sickly hoped might happen at the outset of this experiment, no Dodger reached the warning track, and only a handful hit balls that would have left your average city park softball field."

*Infield

That leads the National League, the White Sox have lost 6 games giving up only 2 runs.

That's about 23% of all games played.

Sounds like we're doing the little things well.

If I include shutouts, the Dodgers have scored 1 run or less in 17 of 59 games (if todays score holds).

Or about 28.8% of all games played. One out of every four games.

All I have to say is, great work, Ned!

---

Now let's GET SOME RUNS!!! (i.e. more than one)

'08 most at-bats:

James Loney 218
Matt Kemp 199
R. Martin 197
Andre Ethier 182
Juan Pierre 176
Jeff Kent 176
Blake DeWitt 164

Lot of "our guys" on there. What's Ned to do?

First 32 games: 172 runs
Next 26 games: 85 runs

From Jon's sidebar

James Loney $400K
Matt Kemp $400K
R. Martin $500K
Andre Ethier $425K
Blake DeWitt $390K

Dodger payroll $113M

Perhaps it would be nice if Ned got "our guys" some help with all that green that he is spending

True, I agree with that, but I suppose, for example, augmenting with someone who hit better than .150 would help (the guy on the DL). That's not really Ned's fault. It's more the chain reaction that resulted from signing Pierre. A lot of things turned for the Dodgers since then.

Ah what are you gonna do?

but now it looks he'll be playing more..

... Oh, Park has been a great story, no doubt. I've been pleasantly surprised by him. But I've never seen him go out and just run through three dominating innings like that in almost a decade. I'm pulling for Park, and I hope that was a sign of really good things to come the rest of this season.

It was the Sandy Alomar Miracle game.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/COL/COL200606110.shtml

208. LoneStar7
203 Yea I'm not down on him, the comment more stemmed from the fact that he sees no playing time whatsoever. Its gotta be nearly impossible to sit for a month then be thrown in against Johan..

Can Joe Beimel not get Willy Taveras out?

Excellent point and one I thought of after I posted my complaint. It is highly likely they went back. My impression was they were on the raft for one night. Did they even have water or food to survive a week out there?

279 I've been reading that he's finally fully recovered from that intestinal surgery he had a while back. That doesn't fully explain how he's been able to go up there and throw as hard as he did in 1996. I mean, 98 MPH, that's just astonishing.

A team this desperate for runs cant continue to give one of their worst hitters the most ABs.

Not deep but it was a line drive shot right at Tavares.

Anyone else think Kent should have hit for Ethier there? Ethier is hitting .160 vs. lefties, and Fuentes is about the most brutal lefty there is. IF we went to extras Kent could have played 2nd and Delwyn could have played right. I know Torre wouldn't be that creative but it seems logical to me...

And yeah, this was a pretty disappointing series, especially after seeing us crush them the first game.

Even Kemp doesnt hit that great against righties.

THe Dodgers really only have 1 developed good hitter that can be consistently counted on---Russ Martin.

How much longer does this team need to tailspin offensively before LaRoche gets called up?

August 9, 2007: Traded by the San Francisco Giants to the Los Angeles Dodgers for a player to be named later and PTBNL or $. The Los Angeles Dodgers sent Travis Denker (minors) (August 25, 2007) to the San Francisco Giants to complete the trade.

http://tinyurl.com/4vdxvl

The easiest thing to do is cut Sweeney, and bring up LaRoche.

Bench Pierre, make Pee Wee the starter in the OF.
Then play LaRoche at 2nd whenver Kent needs a day off, or at 1st whenver a lefty starts.

The Pierre/Maza/Hu stuff needs to end, regardless of what happens with Furcal.

If the Rangers lose games, at least they have a lot of offense.

If the Giants lose games, at least they're in the game until the bully blows it.

If the Reds lose games, at least you get to see a couple of home runs.

There are some days, like this one, where I don't know how all of us can stay fans of a team that has been this lousy for THIS long. That's what I call loyalty.

Well lace up your cleats and shine up your batting helmet! You're playing the Dodgers! When those boys from Los Angeles are on the field, losing streaks end and winning streaks continue. Mark Sweeney's on that team, Bunky, and if it's close in the late innings, they'll send him up to bat! A brighter day is coming. The sun is shining again and everybody's happy!

Well, looking at our hitting position by position:

C: Very good OBP, not much power
1B: Terrible production for 1st base
2B: Way below average
SS: Beyond pathetic (with Raffy out)
3B: Pretty Good OBP, average power
LF: Poor
CF: Nice with Kemp there, pathetic with Druw
RF: Above average

Just like that. What do you expect, we don't have anyone with an OPS above .843. Today we had OPS's of .679, .674, .608, .424, + the pitcher in the lineup. You just aren't gonna score any runs like that. In order to score, we need Furcal to come back strong, get Kent/Laroche to play productive at 2nd, need Loney to step it up A LOT, and need Kemp to have a big second half or get some help from Andruw. Otherwise, we won't be a good offense.

We don't have any great hitters (yet) so we need everyone to produce, not have 5 out of the 9 spots be automatic outs practically.