From the Los Angeles Dodgers holding a nine game lead in the NL West at the start of July, to briefly losing the first place spot, to then sweeping the San Diego Padres to get the lead back, LA has shown tons of inconsistency this summer.
As September baseball begins and the postseason is just 25 games away, one of the most respected veteran leaders in the clubhouse, Miguel Rojas, spoke on the commitment he and his team are making for the most important stretch of the year.
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“You guys gotta understand, we’re human beings,” Rojas said. “And sometimes you get tired, especially mentally. And you got a lot of things going on in your life, and your year, and it’s not easy to be locked in every single time. But I feel like we made a commitment to be locked in for 25 more games, plus the 20 or whatever we need to play in the playoffs.”
Rojas wasn’t the only one to address the recent uneasiness in the standings as All-Star catcher Will Smith — who bailed the Dodgers out on Sunday to avoid a sweep with a pinch-hit walk-off home run — spoke on taking care of business.
“We’ve got to play well, play good baseball, take care of it,” Smith said.
Although it seems like the defending champions can seemingly flip a switch and get back to their elite level of play, manager Dave Roberts recently spoke on the harmful nature of having that mindset. After Sunday’s victory, however, the skipper admitted that he does in fact believe his team can turn things around.
“I do think that a flip can be switched,” Roberts said. “It doesn’t feel good for me saying it. … Whatever it is, we’ve got to do it right now. We’ve got to win today. We’ve got to play better baseball. We’ve got to play more focused baseball and then let the chips fall where they may. There’s just more in there. There just is.”
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Photo Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images
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6 Responses
They’re people, good people for the most part, but people. How hard you try isn’t always part of it, some days you’re on and some days you’re not. When you’re on a roll it’s easy, when you’re in a rut it’s like a root canal while waiting in line at the DMV.
Practice and training and coaching and everything else helps, but some days you have it and some days you don’t.
While mostly true, they are in one of the longest ruts in over a decade. After last night’s woeful performance, yielding 9 runs to one of the worst teams in all of baseball offensively (Pirates are 30th in runs, OPS,TBs, and HRs, 28th in BA), they are now 28-29 in their last 57 games since the midpoint, when they were 50-31 (while 3 opening days starters were out). That’s a horrific pattern for over a third of the season, not some day on or day off or rut. It’s systemic and not being addressed. We’ve seen them get swept 5 times, two of those to a team (Angels) with a losing record, split a 4 game set with the worst team in MLB (Rockies), lose 2 out of 3 at home to another team with a losing record (DBacks) – and did their best implosion attempt to be swept in the 3rd game, losing 2 out of 3 at home to another team (Cardinals) with a losing record.
All the “play harder, step it up, try harder cliches come across as empty as the results prove otherwise. It’s very frustrating and disappointing.
There is no switch to flip. This team is physically and mentally tired. How are we going to win a world series without a bullpen. Our outfield defense is sub par. We have Conforto in the lineup. What a joke. Let’s face it, if the Padres weren’t 3-7 in their last 10 games, we would be a 2nd place team. It’s appearing that we are going to be 3rd in the NL standings, and playing in the wild card round. If we get swept in it, that would not be a shocker. The way that this team has been playing, is not Dodger baseball.
The bullpen has been torched – the bullpen games have really taken a toll on them. The amount of runs this staff has given up is very uncharacteristic of a Dodger pitching staff.
Offensively – the team started the season well – but it has been a downward slide. There have been times when they have had three players in the lineup batting under .200 – with Conforto being a huge drain. With Ohtani, T. Hernandez, Pages and Conforto striking out so much – that is a lot of no contact outs with runners on with less than two out who don’t get move along our scored.
There is a lot of instability in the lineup. I guess that is a bad part of having so much versatility. Players show up at the park – “where am I playing and when do I bat?” It can lead to some defensive inconsistency, particularly at 3rd base.
Now the starters are back and going deeper into games, but as of now there are no relievers that can be relied upon to shut a team down.
That’s a lot to overcome and does not bode well for the post season.
Tiredness is not the answer the correct answer is laziness and dumbest. Its because you won the World Series Championship 2024 you’re not interested to win this season. Wake up Mr. FRIEDMAN you’re Loss again to pirates what if they play with Brewer. Tiger and Astro. More frustrating with the fans. Ohtani. Betts, Freeman next year maybe much worst because age matters. I’m a very much Dodger fan but at this time. I rather go with the Padres a team that never say dies.
Although I basically agree with you, your “rather go with the Padres” at the end betrays everything you said. No true Dodger fan would root for the Padres. Period. Full stop.