Today's game
Should be getting a laptop delivered to the hotel later today. We're the national game on FOX, so be sure to tune in.
Here's the lineup:
Furcal, SS
Cruz, CF
Nomar, 1B
Drew, RF
Kent, 2B
Ethier, LF
Izturis, 3B
Hall, C
Hendrickson, P
Inside the Dodgers 
Let’s hope Drew & Kent get there power back, I know they’ve had nagging injuries for a while so I can understand there lack of power. Let’s get ‘um today blue crew!
Tell me what team does Hall think would make him the everyday catcher?
Hall from what I’ve seen is a pretty good hitter, I went to last saturdays game & he had like 3 or 4 hits, I really doubt he’d be a starting catcher any were else maybe I’m wrong on this one, he seems to forget he played for a very bad team, don’t get me wrong TB has some great young talent but there not contenders just yet.
i think the rockies might take him because torrealba is getting old
i also think kemp should play today because he hit righty pitchers better and suppan pitched 3.1 innings and gave up 10 runs to a 60-70% right handed batter lineup
Hall also has a very good arm. He has been in the 30-40% range in catching baserunners his whole career. He is actually a pretty good hitter for a catcher with that kind of arm. Dont know much abou this game calling or receiving skills- cant say that ive ever been to or even seen a d-ray game. I suspect he would be a starter on several NL teams.
Kemp is in Vegas, where he belongs (for now).
closing in on 100 games played and still tough to figure this team, and therefore to handicap their chances in the division.
unlike 2004 (at least the first half) when they had great defense, some speed and pop from beltre and a great bullpen, this team has average to poor starting pitching, suspect bullpen, below average defense and no pop.
but they do hit for average and score runs .go figure?!? and they are still in the thick of it. another above average starter or reliever would make a big difference. of course so would a hot streak by jane d. drew and kent.
what is drew still doing in the cleanup spot?
would hate to see them lose a lot of young talent unless it was for d-trelle willis. soriano would be awesome, but again, for only three months, is it worth it?
also saw edwin jackson as a d-ray on the dish last week. wow what a fall he has taken. he is now a “long reliever” for a sub .500 team and still in his early 20s.
still don’t love baez, but jackson might be another can’t miss prospect that missed!
also noticed james loney in the AAA all star game this week. didn’t realize he leads the PCL with a .385 average. not much power, but he has a great glove and apparently a pretty consistent stick.
Looks like we sent Kemp down prematurely. If we were not going to play Ledee instead of Cruz in the outfield (especially batting lefty), we should have left Kemp with the Dodgers until Ledee was ready to do more than pinch hit.
I see Pujols has just tatered to left center. Nothing to be ashamed of there. Interpol is right, Drew and Kent will have to start shouldering the load. No way was one run going to hold up against this line up.
But that is what it is going to take for Blue to make a run at it. Drew and Kent and one more pitcher.
I agree, its time for Drew and Kent to get it in gear or we are going nowhere.
I had a question I wanted to ask here, since I know some people in the front office post these blogs, hoping someone will read it and maybe offer some insight here.
I see Cruz is starting against a right hander, and everyone on the forums always says he cant hit righties. Here’s my question? Would Grady or hitting coach Eddie Murray ever consider having Cruz abandon his whole switch hitting thing and just be a full time righty. I analyzed stats from 2003-2005 and Cruz is batting .232 against righties and as a left handed batter, and he’d batting .291 against lefties and as a right handed batter. In that time, there have been 7 times when he abandoned the switch hitting thing, and just hit righty against a righty, and he got 2 hits. I know that 7 at bats isnt a big sample, but 2/7 = a .285 average, which is pretty much what he hits normally as a right handed batter. It kinda seems to me that Cruz’s problem may not be against right handed pitchers, just he’s not as good as a left handed batter, and I was wondering if anyone would tell him that, or if the manager and hitting coach will always leave the choice to switch hit up to the individual batter.
This team gives me such pain
Just wondering whether Kent should not be on the DL. There’s been no power for a month, and he just doesn’t even seem to swing right since his rib muscle injury.
Kent, my favorite player looks lost at the plate while I see Tony Larussa(sp) just playing with the Dodgers in bad pitches. I don’t get it. the Dodgers lead the N.L. in offense and they are being shut down by a struggling Suppan???? Drew walks too much and Kent isn’t anymore a power hitter. Drew and Kent needs to get their power together like in ’05 when they were together for a short piece to time. They were 12-2 when Kent and Drew hit for power.
Just my 2 cents.
As long as Drew and Kent don’t hit or hit for power this season is over.
Nomar, Drew, and Kent combined have less HR’s than Pujols. Let’s face it this team has no power that scares the other manager on a consistent basis. We are paying a TON of money to Drew for okay production. The GM has some big moves to make and soon.
We need a bat more than pitching right now. Unless Drew and Kent start hitting for power and driving in runs, we are sunk.
6 points
1) Matt Kemp received a net promotion, as he has not played in AAA Las Vegas before. When he was called up, he was with AA Jacksonville.
2) Danys Baez is the last person in the world I would ever suspect of breaking Hershiser’s streak.
3) Tomko and Gagne will apparently draw comparisons with Tomko going to the bullpen. Tomko said he was going to go out and throw “nothing under 95 mph”, but what made Gagne devastating was not just his fastball, but his circle change and curve too. So I’ll wait until after a few outings before declaring that he should start wearing goggles on the mound.
4) Mark Hendrickson, lacking run support for no reason in particular, pitched a good game. Jonathan Broxton added to his effort, and is probably good enough to be a setup man. He’s close to being a closer though.
5) Things are looking up. Brad Penny pitches tomorrow, and then its another 4 game series in AZ. The first weekend back in Dodger Stadium, the Dodgers host the Cardinals. Starters for that series: Brad Penny, Chad Billingsley, Derek Lowe.
6) Jason Repko is rehabbing in Vegas. As soon as he’s back, Cruz should be released or shipped out. Repko is just a much more productive player.
hendrickson’s performance gives me some hope. he can eat up some innings and give the ball club a chance to win.
what’s going on with the offense latetly though? in the first half the dodgers did a much better job of plating those runners in scoring position.
i’m glad kemp went to AAA. he needs to play everyday. hopefully he tears up that league.
cruz jr. we don’t need him. he should just try and bat right handed. it’s obvious he can’t hit lefty.
Cruz Jr. hit the ball really hard in one at bat, I thought the ball had a chance to go out, the thing that mind boggels me is why bat him 2nd!!!???
Get Cruz Jr. a one-way ticket to “Palookaville”… He’s now officially a 1st class bum!
I still thinks he’s serviceable, but not & the top of the lineup
Cruz has been in the majors since 1997. I don’t see him as serviceable.
he’s not tearing it up like he use too. what do you mean I don’t get it?
What is the meaning of putting A guy hitting .235 in the # 2 slot? Ive never heard of anything that crazy. Ever. How is that possible? isnt there some kind of sanity check when the lineup cards are made that would catch something like that? Is this team just asleep at the wheel? They looks like they are. Another frustrating 1 run loss. Id like to know the teams record in extra innings and in 1 run games. It really seems like were just waiting to loose when its close and late. I suspect were something like 0-5 or 0-6 in extra inning games. Im afraid thats what happens when you have a team that gets shut out and never gets a baserunner to econd base and the next day the manager is joking about how well we ran the bases. Thats not funny. Where the sense of urgency to win? Im loosing faith in Grady.
“Does the lack of power bother Little?
“The same way my hair turning gray bothers me,” the manager said. “Not a lot I can do about it. Got to live with it. We’re trying to hit more home runs as a ballclub than Albert Pujols.”
More jokes. Awesome. How about were furious that our high priced power hitters havnt been able to get the ball out of the infield on a regular basis? !
drj884
I hear & feel you’re frustration, they have nagging injuries, let’s hope they heal sooner rather than later.
I was wondering how the starting rotation was doing, so I calculated the current starters’ game scores (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_Score ), and then plotted the time-sequence line charts to look for trends. Here’s what I noticed for D-Lowe, Penny, Billingsley, and Sele, based on some pictures (which I don’t have the capability of posting here):
D-Lowe: has a tendency to peak, then let off slightly, then crash, then peak, repeating the whole cycle. Rebounds with his best stuff after hitting rock bottom.
Penny: Either good or meh. Consistent and stays in long stretches of high, shorter low points.
Sele: Remarkably consistent, overall. While it looked like he was crashing, he recovered and looks like he’ll have a smooth line around 60 (60 is the score for his second game, May 13 at San Francisco).
Billingsley: Trend towards an overall rise, suggesting improvement with more experience at the major league level.
The Dodgers have a lot of problems. Grady Little and his humorous take on losing is one of them.
Fliegel, would you prefer that the team gets angry at each other, points fingers, and accuse teammates of racism? It didn’t work last year. That Grady can remain calm and himself and not do anything stupid when things aren’t going so well is a credit to him, because that only leads to stupidity, which does not bring out improvement.
Staying angry does no one any good, and Grady has a positive impact on attitudes. That’s the biggest difference a manager can make.
Clearly these are different times, but can you see Lasorda joking around after getting embarrassed in SLT? fact is this is an over payed, over-hyped team that would be in last in any other division. There are times when “remaining calm” is not the right thing- this team plays with very little heart and drive with a few exceptions. Watching them the last month- I can not be a fan of this product.