Dodgers: Dave Roberts Doesn’t Believe Fans Will Let the ‘Astros Narrative’ Die

The Dodgers head into Tuesday night’s game against the Astros as one of baseball’s hottest teams, but that won’t be the headline in what has been a highly anticipated matchup.

Instead, expect to hear more about the year 2017 — the year that the Astros cheated their way to a World Series title — than 2021.

The Dodgers have had time to prepare for this matchup. They’ve exorcised their playoff demons by winning it all last season, but there are still hints of frustration and resentment for what went down four seasons ago. If you don’t believe me, just ask Austin Barnes.

Related: Austin Barnes Slams the Astros in return to Houston

Unlike his players, manager Dave Roberts has tried taking a much more civil approach to this series. He did his best to say that the events of 2017 are in the rearview mirror during his press conference prior to the game today, but even that sounded like it was more of a work in progress than anything else. However, for fans, Roberts doesn’t believe the issue with Houston will go away anytime soon.

I don’t know. I think that the world.. sports fans.. the world doesn’t really appreciate cheating. And so when it’s kind of brought to light, and you know we didn’t have fans last year. So this is highly anticipated by baseball fans, which I really do believe is great for the game. But it’s going to be exponentially crazy when [the Astros] come to our place, I’m sure.

It’s safe to say that these games will have a different feel than most other regular-season matchups, but the Dodgers will try and focus on simply coming out on top. They head into tonight’s matchup on a 7-game winning streak with a chance to tie the Padres for first place in the National League after San Diego’s loss to Milwaukee Monday night.

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