Dodgers Team News

Dodgers: Dave Roberts Explains Himself for Having Heaney Pitch in Relief on Thursday

The Dodgers continue to add to their franchise record total with win 108 against the Padres on Thursday, but the story comes from the bullpen rotation by Dave Roberts. Brusdar Graterol drew the start for the Dodgers and pitched one inning recording two earned runs and one strikeout, the only two scores by the Padres for the remainder of the game.

In the second inning, Andrew Heaney came into the game and went on to pitch 4.0 innings delivering six strikeouts and zero earned runs. This was done on purpose by Roberts who had a postseason rotation in mind with Heaney coming out of the bullpen.



“It’s just something to continue to give us optionality going forward. Andrew’s been a starter his entire career. So to kind of give him a little opportunity to come out of the ’pen and see what that’s like, feel what that’s like, just made a lot of sense.”

Whether it’s smoke and mirrors or what Roberts truly believes the rotation will come down to, this showed that the Dodgers could heavily lean on different guys in roles they aren’t accustomed with to help pick up the slack. With the injuries amounted within the lineup, this isn’t out of the realm of possibility. 

Having the options may seem difficult to deal with as the team goes through multiple scenarios, but Roberts believes it actually will make things easier moving forward. The flexibility given after the top of the pitching rotation will surely come in handy as teams prepare for back-to-back playoff games.

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