The Los Angeles Dodgers are starting the month of May statistically tied for first place with the San Diego Padres, and only 0.5 games ahead of the San Francisco Giants. If they would like to put a little breathing room between themselves and these two teams, this month would be a good time to do it.
Continue reading “Dodgers News and Notes: Roster Trimmed to 26, Tommy Kahnle’s Dodger Debut and More”
April is coming to a close and along with it the first month of the 2022 season. Right now, the Los Angeles Dodgers are 12-6, and in second place in the NL West, 0.5 games behind the San Francisco Giants.
Overall, the Dodgers have played well. But for as talented and stacked as this team is, they are still leaving some things to be desired. But we will start with the best parts of the team.
Continue reading “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly from the First Month of 2022 Dodgers Baseball”
Through the Los Angeles Dodgers Spring Training and into the start of the season, fans wondered about Cody Bellinger and if he would ever regain his 2019 NL MVP status.
Bellinger looked lost at the plate in Spring Training, striking out a lot and barely getting the bat on the ball. He was tinkering much with his swing, trying to find his form. He quipped that he was just getting his “punchies” (his word for strikeouts) out of the way in Spring Training.
Continue reading “Dodgers News and Notes – Bellinger Player of the Week, Dodgers Pitching Dominance and More”
The Dodgers sandwiched a pair of fantastic performances on Friday and Sunday around a lackluster offensive effort on Saturday, giving good reason why many pundits view them as the best team in the majors at this point of the season.
Continue reading “Bellinger, Dodgers Power Past Padres in San Diego”
The Los Angeles Dodgers are off to one of the league’s hottest starts. However, this early in the season things are changing daily, as four out of the five best records in the National League are in the West division. The Mets became the first team to win 10 games, while the Dodgers had an off day yesterday.
Continue reading “Dodgers Head to San Diego for First Series Against Padres”
The Los Angeles Dodgers have just finished their first home stand of the season, going 7-1 combined against the Cincinnati Reds and the Atlanta Braves. After a day off on Thursday, they will be heading down the California coast to face division rivals San Diego Padres for a three games set ay PetCo Park.
Continue reading “Dodgers News and Notes- Update on Heaney’s Shoulder, Bauer’s Leave Extended, and More”
Although the Dodgers showed a bit of spark and promise on Opening Day, there wasn’t really much to write home about in the next two games, as the Rockies took 2022’s opening series two games to one on Sunday.
Continue reading “Rockies Handle Sluggish Dodgers in 2022’s Opening Series”
The Dodgers won eight consecutive National League Western Division crowns from 2013-2020.
That streak was broken last year when the San Francisco Giants won 107 games, and the division along with it. The Dodgers came up one game short from a ninth straight NL West title. However, they’d get their revenge in October beating the Giants in five games in the division series.
Continue reading “Which Team Poses Biggest Threat to Dodgers in NL West?”
Well folks, we’ve reached February and although the MLBPA and Major League Baseball have met in recent days, they are no closer to reaching an agreement than when the lockout started in early December.
With Spring Training scheduled to start in two weeks for pitchers and catchers, the possibility of the season starting on time is getting smaller with each second that passes by.
The two sides remain far apart, and it seems that the Players Union is the only one willing to negotiate. The MLBPA proposed the following two areas on Tuesday-
Negotiations were said to be “heated” in a meeting that lasted just 90 minutes. When the two sides last week, MLB agreed to the concept of the bonus pool, but were starting with just $10 million.
In an article by Evan Drellich, the union’s plan would award a full year of MLB service time to rookies who finish in the top five in their league for Rookie of the Year, top three for reliever of the year and/or make first- or second-team All-MLB. Using an average of bWAR and fWAR, non-outfielders and non-pitchers who finish in the top seven of their positions in their respective leagues also would qualify, as would pitchers and outfielders who finish in the top 20. Previously, the union offered top 10 and top 30 respectively.
There currently is no plan for the two sides to meet again. It could happen later this week, it may not be until next week, when there is a regular quarterly meeting of owners in Florida. It is not probable that there would be a lockout meeting while the owners are meeting, however. If nothing happens next week, then we are on to the next week, when spring training is supposed to start. So unless something drastic happens, do not count on spring training and probably the season starting on time.
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts spoke with SNLA’s Kirsten Watson on Tuesday about what has been the hardest part of the lockout for him personally.
“It’s been different this time, with the lock out, and I can’t…. This is the time where I really connect with the players, and get the vibe of how things are going and talk to them about spring training and how their off-seasons are going and right now we can’t talk to the player so that’s been different….I love time with the family but I’m staring to get antsy for things to start”.
He went on to say that at this point, he and the coaching staff have plans A, B, C, and D as far as the roster when baseball resumes, and believes that it will move quickly once it does.
Roberts also mentioned the president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman and the front office are having conversations, and that that he (Roberts) believes there will be a lot of player movement once the lockout is resolved.
Tangentially, ZiPS has the Dodgers winning the most games in the National League next season, roster as is. No doubt Friedman and company have many different plans for shoring up the pitching staff and bettering the team.
Another year has come to a close, and with it memories of what has been tend to creep in. Even though it didn’t end the way Dodger fans wanted it to, it still was a very memorable year.
Aside from the 2020 season, which ended in a championship, this 2021 season will probably be the most memorable for awhile, with all its ups, down, and everything in between.
Continue reading “Looking Back on the Dodgers 2021 Season with Bright Hope for 2022”
Think Blue Planning Committee 