Dave Roberts Has High Praise for Dodgers’ Bottom of Lineup
On most nights, the Los Angeles Dodgers’ three former Most Valuable Players are good enough to beat anyone. However, for the Dodgers to be the best team in Major League Baseball, they need production from all nine spots in the lineup.
Starting with a 10-0 win over the New York Mets on Sunday, the bottom third of the lineup has finally started producing. It carried over into the first two games against the Washington Nationals, which resulted in 4-1 and 11-2 wins.
“It’s big, I’m sure, for their confidence,” said Dodgers manager Dave Roberts. “We’re going to have a lot of people on base. So for those guys, they’ve got to have the ability to take good at-bats and be able to get a base hit when needed.”
Roberts has used James Outman, Andy Pages, Kiké Hernandez, Gavin Lux, and Miguel Rojas in the seventh, eighth, and ninth spots throughout the last three games. Nobody has made a louder splash than Pages.
On Sunday, Pages was 2-for-4 with his first career home run, three RBIs and two runs scored. He launched his second career home run on Wednesday night in a 3-for-5 effort with one RBI and three runs scored.
In the three games combined, the bottom third is 11-for-37. More importantly, they have kept the lineup moving. On Wednesday night, the Dodgers recorded 20 hits and five of them came from Pages and Lux.
“For me, it’s not necessarily the slug with those guys,” Roberts said Tuesday. “It’s conducting at-bats and keeping the line moving, getting a hit when needed. I can’t say enough about those guys’ at-bats tonight.”
Photo Credit: Geoff Burke-USA TODAY Sports
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