Dodgers News: Roberts High on Trayce Thompson Regardless of September Slide
Dodgers outfielder Trayce Thompson has been one of the most pleasant surprises for Los Angeles fans this season. After being acquired to temporarily fill in for Mookie Betts while Betts was nursing a rib injury, Thompson played so well that he stuck around, eventually earning himself a no-doubt spot on the postseason roster.
All of that remains true even though Thompson is hitting just .226 with a .730 OPS over the past two weeks. As J.P. Hoornstra reports in the Orange County Register, L.A. manager Dave Roberts is still high on Thompson, who had two of the Dodgers’ three hits in Sunday afternoon’s loss to the Rockies.
“He’s obviously since he came up he’s had some big hits for us and played great defense and performed very consistently,” manager Dave Roberts said. “The last couple weeks I think it’s been a little grind for him, but he’s still taking walks when he needs to. For him to get a couple hits I thought was really good. He’s hitting good pitching. His quality of at-bat isn’t going unnoticed.”
It’s also worth noting just how small a time period we’re talking about with Trayce’s slump. We mentioned the .226 average and .730 OPS over the last two weeks (10 games), but those numbers were .148 and .509 through the first eight games of this slump. Thompson went 3-for-4 with a double and four walks between Saturday and Sunday.
Perhaps most notable is that Thompson only struck out once in the eight plate appearances between Saturday and Sunday, after striking out 12 times in 32 plate appearances in his previous eight games. His overall strikeout rate this year is 35.9%, higher than everyone on the team except Joey Gallo. But his 12.8% walk rate is also second-highest on the team (behind Max Muncy), as well as his .525 slugging percentage (2nd behind Betts) and his .363 on-base percentage (2nd behind Freddie Freeman).
So, Thompson has earned his spot on the postseason roster, and hopefully, his eight-game mini-slump got that out of his system and he rolls into October ready to go on a tear.
Have you subscribed to our YouTube Channel yet? Subscribe and hit that notification bell to stay up to date on all the latest Dodgers news, rumors, interviews, live streams, and more!
NEXT: Will Craig Kimbrel be on the Postseason Roster?
