Dodgers Lose to Nationals in Embarrassing Fashion, Have Now Lost 5 of 7 Games
The Los Angeles Dodgers were shut out by the Washington Nationals on Wednesday. Yes, you’re reading that correctly.
The Dodgers, with a lineup that includes three former MVPs at the top, suffered their first shutout of the season, in a 2-0 loss to Washington at Dodger Stadium.
The Dodgers were shutout by four National pitchers. Jake Irvin, who entered the day with a 4.24 ERA this season, threw six shutout innings, allowing just four hits while striking out six. Then, he was followed by Robert Garcia, Hunter Harvey and Kyle Finnegan, who combined to allow just one hit and one walk across three shutout innings.
This was the Dodgers’ most embarrassing loss of the season, and it caps off an overall disappointing week.
The Dodgers have gone 2-5 in their last seven games, and have now lost back-to-back series to the Nationals and division-rival San Diego Padres. Both series came at Dodger Stadium.
Fortunately, the Dodgers have an off-day on Thursday, and it’s much-needed. The team has dropped to 12-9 on the year after starting the season 7-2. And after scoring at least five runs in each of their first 10 games, they’ve now scored fewer than five runs in seven of their last 11 games.
The bottom of the lineup has been a serious issue, while Freddie Freeman is in a slump — especially for his standards — with just two hits in his last 20 at-bats. One bright spot was Landon Knack, who made his MLB debut on Wednesday and pitched very well, even after allowing two runs in the first inning.
Knack ended up going five innings, allowing two runs on four hits while striking out four.
After the game, he spoke to our Doug McKain about the outing:
“The second I walked out and picked up the ball and stood on the mound for a second and looked up, I was like, ‘Alright, we’re here,'” Knack said. “After that second inning, we felt really good. Knew that basically after that, just rip it and just go.”
The Dodgers open up a three-game series against the red-hot New York Mets on Friday at Dodger Stadium before they travel back to the East Coast to face Washington again, this time in the Nation’s Capital.
Photo Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports
No matter how many MVPs you have or how much money you spend, you still have to play baseball, the toughest sport to play, between the lines!
It seems to us that the Dodgers, with all the constant line-up changes, and platooning that the inept Dave Roberts employs, the players look unsettled. With all the juggling player movement, they’re unsure if they’re going to play that day or night, be sent down, traded, or just taking a roster spot.
A manager needs to manage players on all player levels, including mental preparation to get ready to play, and the Dodger players at this moment, seem to be unsettled, with Roberts experimenting with different lineup moves, and with the Dodgers’ plethora of players, it feels like they’re still trying to figure out the everyday team as if they were still in Spring Training. Other than the Big Three, Smith and Teoscar Hernandez, it looks like a number of players are pressing, not feeling confident, and LA’s management needs to figure it out, and correct it quickly in order to gain team chemistry.
Michael Busch was one of those unsettled players, and we’re wondering what Dodger baseball operations genius decided Outman was a better choice than Busch?
Outman is not the pure hitter Busch is, and it’s another loss for LA via their Hedge Fund baseball decision-makers, none of which are highly knowledgeable baseball player evaluators!
Pitching-wise, the Dodgers have a slew of injured pitchers; a number coming off surgeries, and others still inexperienced, and not ready for Prime Time. Brasier & Vesia are also two under-achievers, performing well below what they’ve shown over the last 2 years.
As it stands now, LA is NOT a lock to win the World Series this year. Note; Ohtani has hit 2 dingers in approximately 100 at bats in his career at Dodger stadium.
Bottom line, yes it’s too early, but there seemingly are many holes to fill, such as, Roberts pet, Max Muncy. He can slug, but he’s not a reliable bat-to-ball hitter. Plus, he can’t field his position, and he’s not good enough to be batting 5th! 6th or 7th is his spot. Gavin Lux is a ONE dimensional player, since he can only play ONE position, second base, and can’t hit well enough to stay in this lineup. LA should consider Muncy and Lux as trade bait. we believe Nolan Arenado wants to come home!
Lastly, have you noticed Dave Roberts is ALWAYS eating something when they show him in the dugout, while other managers are flashing signs, and writing notes?
Careful, there are many Roberts fan boys here that will try to shut you down because you made realistic, honest comments about him. They demand he gets ALL or MOST of the credit for regular season success but NONE or very LITTLE of the blame for epic playoff failures. The cognitive dissonance by these or similar statements is shocking.
Roberts acts like a guy too confident in his job security. These fan boys say, “he’s a player’s manager” as if that alibis utter under achieving and under performance. Remember, Mattingly, his predecessor, was summarily dismissed after losing in the NLCS followed by 2 consecutive losses in the NLDS. Sound familiar? If not, See 2021, 2022, and 2023 seasons.
Sure, we have 141 games left, and it’s a marathon, not a sprint. But losing 2 home series in a row to San Diego and Washington – Washington???? – is not a good trend, both of whom were under .500 coming into those series. Pathetic is more like it.
The lineup has been anemic, including parts of the Big 3. Freddie’s in a funk. Ohtani can’t get a hit with RISP. Something has to crank these guys up.
Absolutely fair, but then it’s up to Roberts to make lineup changes or anything to get a spark – or crank these guys up in the terms you used. That he fails to do so is on him and a reflection in his confidence in job security. I’ve been a fan for over 50 years and have never seen a more disengaged ineffective manager of this team. His playoff failures are many and epic and now they drop over a billion dollars in the offseason to lose 2 home series to the Padres and the Nationals and play like this??!! Unreal. What is one thing – anything – that Roberts has done to light a spark under these guys? Don’t think about it because the answer is nothing. And we have a string of 6 straight playoff losses in our back pocket to teams that finished 22 and 16 games behind us. Fantastic! (eye roll)
I now live in Maryland and have already bought tix to next week’s series between LAD and the Nats. They are currently advertising it as “Another series W against the Dodgers”. That should be unthinkable. It certainly isn’t tolerable or sustainable.
Only thing embarrassing with the Dodgers is Dave Roberts and he been embarrassment for the last 5 years.. and because he kisses managements a** they will not fire his incompetent A**!!
100% right! And he knows his job is secure.
Oh here they come!…The legion of Roberts haters. Wow. You all must me from that generation of coddled children who were not allowed to lose. Who always went home with the participation trophy!…Well welcome to life boys!. Baseball has been like this since the beginning. Way before Manfred and his idiotic pitch clock and 3 batter minimum, and two throws to first base before run as you will with no throw takes place.!! Manfred tries his best to take the job of managing away from the managers. He’s taking defense away from the defenders. He’s totally ruining the game of baseball!….But yeah….You go ahead and blame Roberts!….Pardon me but that’s about as stupid as it gets!