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Dodgers: Why Trevor Bauer Was Pulled From the Game Early in Wednesday’s Loss

Wednesday night was not the way the Dodgers would have liked to end their brief road trip. While they do come back home with 4 wins in 5 games, the Astros beat up on them a little bit in the final game. 

Trevor Bauer came out and threw 37 pitches in the first inning. And while the Astros only scored 1 run, it did put the Dodgers in a tough spot. Dave Roberts really did not want to go to his relief team too early with a bullpen game scheduled for Thursday.



But to his credit, Bauer rebounded nicely and got through 6 innings of work. He left the game with the Dodgers trailing by a run and only at 100 pitches. He’s come out for another inning of work at a higher pitch count than that this year. Doc explained part of the decision to pull him after the loss. 

I absolutely thought he could have kept going. I just thought he gave us what he needed to give us tonight. …If we didn’t push him in that last one, I might have pushed him a little bit tonight. But I have got to kind of look at past starts, the recency and how he’s throwing the baseball on that particular night, when his next start is and kind of make a decision and that’s a decision I made.

After Bauer left, the Dodgers bullpen surrendered 3 more runs to seal the Astros’ win. Sheldon Neuse’s late homerun made the Bauer pull a little tougher to swallow once the game was over. You can’t help but wonder if that would have tied the game had Bauer come out for 1 more. 

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But regardless of what could have happened, the Dodgers are going to protect their guys. Bauer threw 126 pitches in San Francisco on Friday, and even though he said he could’ve gone more, it doesn’t seem worth the risk in a May game. 

Move on to the next series. 

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10 Comments

  1. Roberts has NO CLUE on how to manage a team ! Why we have BULLPEN games when we have a proven starter in Price is beyond reasoning. Any other team would LOVE to have Price as a starter.

    1. Right on, Greg! As I said these BP games will eventually backfire on Roberts and we also can see how not having a DH has made decision making a real struggle for Roberts that he didn’t have last year.

    2. who manages the dodgers last year when they won every playoff series and ultimately the World Series? Price can’t go even 5 innings anymore based on what we see from him, so he’s not an option. Gonsolin is close – he’s your 5th starter

  2. With all this alleged depth, one would think Dodgers could find a 5th starter and not have to play BP games. This will haunt team later in season. They certainly could have gotten someone to fill in the 5th spot until Gonsolin is ready.

    1. That’s pitching depth for both starters and the pen. take a pitcher out of the pen to start every 5th game, and you just weakened the pen. Dodgers are doing the right thing, building T-Gon up so he can be the 5th starter, and solidify the pen. He’s coming back soon – so a few bullpen games has not and will not come back to haunt the team later in the season.

  3. So the bullpen (Jones) gets blamed for allowing 3 runs; however, Lux’ & Bett’s throwing errors are really to blame. Our defense has been awful so far this year and we keep moving people around and expecting there to be no consequences to our defense. IMO this needs to get fixed if we want to repeat.

  4. That crappy throw to first base by Lux is why the game was lost. This is not the first time he has lost a game with a bad throw to first. He knows it. So practice throwing strikes to first.

    1. like Corey? Gavin is doing fine – an error now and then is ok, and he has room to improve as he gets more big league experience at SS

  5. Bauer was clearly having an off night. Doc made the right move. He had hit 100 pitches after 3 straight 110+ pitch count games. Doc did not know Lux would air mail the throw. Or that the bullpen would not do a solid job. Give the guy a break. On the road our 8 game win streak was broken against a good team. And we won last night. Hindsight is 20 20. We are doing well for having 2 All Stars on the shelf along with 2 solid starters. Help is on the way. Relax!

  6. By the way, Lux has a .4 WAR for fielding. He is a better fielder at SS than you think.

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