2015 Los Angeles Dodgers

Z on inside pitching:

http://network.yardbarker.com/author/article_external/19647529?widget=true

 

http://dodgersdigest.com/2015/10/06/lets-see-as-much-kenley-jansen-as-possible-please/

And we hope the following are never to be seen:

Juan Nicasio
Jo-El Peralta
Pedro Baez
J.P. Howell
Luis Avilan
Yimi Garcia
Adam Liberatore
Chris Hatcher

Basically, a entire bullpen of muckers save for Jansen. Worse than last years' and that's saying a lot.

Shout-out to Brian Wilson......not!

 

Same old story - bullpen can't work out of a tight one and we lose. Eh.

Jacob deGrom was great. He got them swinging at his high heat and no one could touch that. By the 3rd he was mixing in the slider and it was lights out Dodgers.

We want to thank Michael Cuddyer for making this a fun game to watch. Crazy call by Collins to stick him out there in a playoff opener. Made a complete mess of two balls he should've caught. Lagares now?

( In his defense :http://nypost.com/2015/03/01/despite-partial-deafness-michael-cuddyer-ok-with-of-shakeup/)

Vin Sculley's missing and that put a damper on things. Heal up Big Red.

More blazing hot heat today - it was 90+ at game time.

Kershaw was on form till that last inning and now we're all spooked. Watching Lackey and the Cards dismantle the Cubbies went down hard in the joint I was watching. It's time to step up or drift away quietly. Woe.

 

A good take on the Wright AB in the 7th. Probably will cost Mattingly in the winter. Hatcher is no sure-thing himself save for better control than Baez. Go full count on a professional hitter in that situation and you're begging for a whuupin'.

http://dodgersdigest.com/2015/10/10/don-mattingly-clayton-kershaw-pedro-baez-and-the-seventh-inning/

 

99 degrees at 1 p.m. PT Saturday atop Dodger Stadium. pic.twitter.com/psVqrQMC39 31m



Some serious gas around here now, the humidity is nasty at the beach.

 

http://dodgersdigest.com/2015/10/10...-2-series-even-after-chase-utley-controversy/

Some crazy slides in these series. Utley's about a 9 on the ugly scale. Best wishes to Tejada.

 

Utley v. Tejada:

 

http://espn.go.com/newyork/mlb/stor...s-hopes-umpires-issue-pregame-warnings-game-3

"It's something that if you really start thinking about, then it might affect your approach and your game," Harvey said. "For me, I gotta go out there and stick with everything that I normally do, and [if] it's a game plan against a certain guy to bust him in, that's part of baseball. That needs to be done. So I'm not going to give up my game plan, my approach, for something like that. It's unfair. If certain situations come up where, you know, I need to throw that pitch, I'm definitely not going to be afraid to go inside."

Harvey, incidentally, has drilled Utley already this season. AfterPhiladelphia Phillies right-hander David Buchanan hit a pair of Mets batters in an April 14 game at Citi Field and Utley homered in the first inning against Harvey, Utley was drilled in the back by a pitch from Harvey in the fifth inning. Harvey then stared down Utley." ESPN

'
Kendrick will start again. Utley a late inning PH as I see it, tho there's this:

"@MScottEiland Depending on how much donnie likes his batter vs. pitcher history matchups, we might actually start Utley. 6-18 against Harvey"


Lot of history here and we haven't even gotten to the J. Roll v. Mets stuff yet. Good game @ Citi tomm nite.

 

http://dodgersdigest.com/2015/10/11/yoenis-cespedes-beat-zack-greinke-in-an-amazing-way/

"The pitch is above the belt and well outside (Larry King is unimpressed). The second impressive part of this pitch was the velocity: just a hair over 94mph. That Cespedes even hit the ball is impressive, let alone that he powered it to the opposite field for a home run.

Thanks to Baseball Savant, it’s pretty easy to dig deeper into both of these facets. Pitch FX shows this pitch as 13 inches from the center of the plate, or about 4-1/2 inches off the edge. Searching Baseball Savant’s database for similar home runs, here are the criteria I used:

• A foot from the center of the plate, outside
• Right-handed batter
• Ball hit in 2015
• Pitch resulted in a home run

Here are the results:

1. Yoenis Cespedes, October 10th 2015

That’s it. He’s the only player to hit a ball in that location for a home run this year. Nobody did it last year. The last time a right-handed batter hit a ball that far off the plate, pitched that fast for a home run was Victor Martinez in the 2013 ALDS. Since Pitch FX has been tracking data in 2008, a home run hit on that kind of pitch has happened only six times. Cespedes’ homer was the second-highest pitch among that group, too. A true outlier."

 

What B.S. No consistency here Joe T. - Bucs ask for redress for Kang?

http://espn.go.com/mlb/playoffs2015...uspended-2-games-slide-broke-ruben-tejada-leg

 

http://dodgersdigest.com/2015/10/12/should-the-dodgers-start-chase-utley-in-game-3-nlds-mets/

Bringing two old ex-Phillies along for this run? Brilliant. Two straws that stir. J. Roll on the bench firing away at Collins and Co. House rocking in Queens tonite.

Like this: Keep Mr. Lowball on the bench:

"

• Because it benefits the Dodgers to be able to pick and choose Utley’s insertion strategically… If you call for Utley in a tie game in the 8th, with men on, and every pitch of vital importance, you put the Mets in a bad spot. Fans will be calling for blood. The pitcher will want to back up his teammates. Either he’ll give in to that and give the Dodgers a free base that would arguably be more important than it would be in the earlier innings, or he’ll at least have something in his head to take some focus away from the job at hand."
• 
  
• 

 

Back to where it usually ends - Kershaw and Greinke need to go big and we hope Pedro Baez is running stairs all nite.

Citi was fun to watch since Dodgers came out swinging agst Harvey. That the Mets did same next inning - kicking a 3 run deficit in short order - was no effort to watch. Anderson is a luck guy - lots of contact and hope someone is in the way to catch it. Rollins an odd choice at SS and looked out of sync on a big play in the 2nd. Eh. Kiki in CF looked lost in the lights - prolly had a bunch of family there for his big nite. We gotta do better than that, which means Joc agst lefty Matz? Probably not. Wake up Kiki.

Monkey-Off-Back Opportunity #10 for Kershaw tonite. If he ever breaks out of this I think we're OK to go through as Greinke is Golden.

 

http://dodgersdigest.com/2015/10/13/the-clayton-kershaw-plan-for-game-4/

Like the man say - bail on him early and pray for rain.

 

I'm going for it. Heading to Goat Hill Tavern for game #4. This may be messing with karma - thru the years with Sox this has been the charm. WS wins 3x here amidst drunken bikers, hookers, geeks, beachboys, alley cats and Ray Donavon wannabes.

I guess this is really the end of the Sox run. Cashing in all my chips for a NLDS win. May regret this.

Mood is kinda ugly now around Dodger talk. Kershaw gets cut down a lot for the team failures. Messed up as that is, it's been 27 years for the Bums. No more talk, get crazy and beat these guys.

 

Great stuff.. That was some real playoff baseball. Hats off to Mets - battled all night. Some classic AB's with Kershaw and Jansen. How it should be - this is a 3 pitcher final for Dodgers: Hatcher, Jansen and Greinke.

Love this game.

Got drunked up with W. from Hawaii & Newport Beach. Goat Hill FTW.

 

Well done Mets. Big ups to Daniel Murphy - One Man Army tonite. Looks like a great series coming up with Cubbies.

Heads up steal of third by Murphy a stunner. After watching the Dodgers forget to cover third after a switch, for probably the 3rd time in this series!!!, Murphy makes game breaker move without a throw. Just wow. Lights out Dodgers. To follow that up with the game winner HR seemed bound to happen. He owned Greinke this series.

Onward.

 

Mark Saxon/ESPNLA tipped his hand by saying that many feel Gabe Kapler took the "Player Development" director position with the understanding he's at the head of the line should Donnie Baseball get the door.

Mattingly did OK with a not great team. It's been reported all year that Freidman & Zaidi have a lot of control over game lineups, callups, demotions etc. Given how screwed up the lineup was last nite, I would think they all have to reconsider their moves from here on in.

Blame game all day on talk radio. Much ado about nothing really considering how this year went. Orel Hershiser been making the rounds and a lot of people seem to be in agreement with some of his key points:

1. Mattingly did what he could with a flawed team.

2. Don't blame a 21 y.o. rookie SS for not covering 3rd while in a switch.

3. In that 4th inning with Murphy on 3rd, Orel said he would have preferred if Ethier makes no play on that foul ball that Murphy scored on.

Yada, yada, yada. I 'm looking forward to Cubs and Mets. Lots to see there.

 

The presser was a non-event as these things go and Donnie Baseball is gone. Local guys grilled Freidman about "accountability for lineups" until he did get a little pissed and said "We all do this together" = manager slaps the lineup up on the dugout wall after FO tinkering.

Consensus seems to be that it was amicable. Donnie had one yr. left on his Dodger contract and wanted a 3 yr. extension which would match the 4 yr. offer he supposedly has from the Marlins.

Gabe Kapler the talk show's pick for new guy. Jon Heyman broke all this early a.m. today and so far he's 50% correct. Prolly wont announce new guy until after Mets sweep Royals.

This should be interesting. Gabe-speak era reaches into Dodger land.




Class Act who will be missed by many. Best of everything to Donnie Baseball. Thanks for the ride.