Possible Postseason Foes

                      With only 18 games left on the schedule, 9 of them against division foes, I thought we might look at the teams LA could possibly face in the playoffs. They are once again in a dead heat with the Phillies for the best record in the majors, but due to the tiebreaker, they would be the #2. seed. I think this works in their favor since the #1 seed has to play the winner of the Padre-Az series as of now. LA would play the winner of whoever meets Milwaukee. Right now, that could be the Mets, or the Braves.    

                                                                                                Atlanta Braves

                      The Braves have gone 5-5 in their last 10 games, and the Mets have won 10 0f their last 11. They are the hot team in the league right now. Like the Dodgers, the Braves are missing some key pieces, especially in their rotation. But they really miss Ronald Acuna’s bat. They lost 1-0 last evening to the Reds. Their big hitters are not getting the job done. 

                  Marcel Ozuna is by far their best hitter right now. But after leading the NL in RBIs for most of the season, he is now behind Ohtani, 101 and Adames 101, with 98. He has 37 homers, good for second behind Ohtani. But most of the rest of the once potent offense are having down years. Olson is hitting .233 with 25 homers, Riley, .256 with 19. Even Orlando Arcia is having a down year. They are so plagued by injuries that they traded with the Giants for Cavan Biggio. 

                 On the pitching side, they have one true Ace, Chris Sale. 16-3, 2.38 ERA, 213 Ks in 167 innings. Morton is 8-8 4.05 ERA, Freid 9-8, 3.35 ERA, and then Reynaldo Lopez, who has been a savior of sorts, 8-5 2.04 ERA. But unlike many teams this season, the Braves staff does not give up a lot of home runs. One thing they do not do, is walk a lot of hitters. They do have a solid bullpen led by Raisel Iglesias who has 31 saves in 34 opportunities. The way to beat Atlanta is shut down their hitters. 

                                                                                               New York Mets

                  The Mets are playing great baseball right now. As of today, September 11th, they are in a dead heat with Atlanta for the third and final wild card spot. They are 8-2 over their last 10 games. They have a lot of power. There are 11 Mets with homers in double figures, including 2 with 30 or more, Alonso, Lindor, and 2 with 20 or more. Although they are 7th in the league in offense, they still can put up big numbers on a team. 

                  Their pitching on the other hand, at least the starting pitching, is another animal altogether. Sean Manaea is their best starter, 11-5, 3.53. Luis Severino is the only other starter with at least 10 wins, 10-5, 3.74. Kodai Senga has made only 1 start and went only 5.1 innings. But they have some good arms in the bullpen. Diaz has 17 saves, but also has 6 blown saves. The Mets as a team have 24 blown saves. So, if you can get to their pen, you have a good chance of winning the game. 

                                                                                           San Diego Padres

                The Dodgers are no stranger to the Padres. This season, the Padres have dominated LA in the 10 games they have played so far, (7-3), outscoring LA, 53-43. The Dodgers as a team have 199 homers as of today, the Padres have 169. Padres also have a higher team batting average, .265-.254 than the Dodgers. But the Dodgers have scored more runs. San Diego has one less game remaining than the Dodgers. The lead is 4.5 right now. Believe it or not, the Padres are the only team in the majors who have struck out less than 1000 times, 943. So, they make contact, and that is what makes them dangerous.  There is only 1 .300 hitter on the team, but he in all likelihood will win his second NL batting title. Arraez is hitting .324. Machado, Merrill and Profar, all have 20+ homers. Merrill will most likely be the ROY. For this reason, I hope LA finishes with the second-best record because it means they would not have to play the winner of the Padres-Az wild card series, but instead would play whoever wins the series with Milwaukee -Atlanta-Mets. 

              Dylan Cease has been one of the Padres best pitchers, 12-11 3.71, and then would come Michael King, 12-8 3.10.  Joe Musgrove and Yu Darvish just recently returned to the rotation. The Padres bullpen has some very good arms including Matsui, Suarez, and Tanner Scott. Suarez has saved 32 games in 36 opportunities. Needless to say, I would rather see the Padres have to use their best against the D-Backs, who lead the NL in offense, than the Dodgers. They would then have to play Philadelphia. The Dodgers lead the Padres by 5 in the loss column.

                                                                                       Milwaukee Brewers

           The Dodgers have played the Brewers 7 times this season. They went 4-3. The last time they played in July was a 4-game series in Milwaukee. They won the first two games, 5-2 and 7-2. They lost the next two despite scoring 4 runs in each. The first loss was a game started by Buehler that they led 3-0 after the first inning, but Buehler gave the lead back in the bottom of the second. He surrendered the lead in the 4th, and even though LA tied the game in the 7th inning, Milwaukee scored an unearned run off of Honeywell in the bottom of the inning on some shoddy fielding, and LA lost the game. Flaherty gave up 3 runs the next day, the Dodgers came back and eventually took the lead 4-3. Then Hudson melted down in the bottom of the eighth and allowed 3 runs for the loss. 

         As it stands right now, the Brewers are 3 games behind the Dodgers for the second-best record in the NL.  Where the Brewers are much better than LA, is in team pitching. As a team, their ERA is 3.58 to the Dodgers 3.85. If they have an Achillies heel, it is that they give up a lot of homers. But they have some very capable starting pitchers as the Dodgers have found out. Freddie Peralta, Collin Rea, and Tobias Myers. They also have a lock down closer in Devin Williams who has saved 10 in 11 chances. He recently returned from the IL. In any case, the Brewers have some very good offensive players, Adames, Contreras, Chourio, who can present problems for your pitching staff. 

                                                                                    Arizona Diamondbacks.

          At the end of August, the Dodgers had a 4-game wraparound series with Arizona, much like they will have against Atlanta from the 12th to the 15th in Atlanta. The games against the Diamondbacks were tense and played in a playoff atmosphere. Game one became a bullpen game because of the injury to Kershaw’s toe. The Dodger offense had jumped on Zac Gallen for 3 runs. Ohtani doubled, was moved to third on a Betts ground out, and then Freeman hit a 2-run homer. But Kershaw gave those runs right back and Kelly made things worse allowing 2 more in the bottom of the third. The Dodgers eventually went up 10-5 with the capper being an Ohtani homer in the 8th. But the Dodger pen almost blew the game allowing 4 runs in the 9th. 

      They would end up winning game 2 despite Stone only going 5 innings and allowing 5 runs. They did something that had never been done in Dodger history when Ohtani, Betts and Freeman homered consecutively in the top of the 1st inning. But it would take a 2-run 8th to secure the 8-6 win. Game 3 was a blowout by Arizona. Game 4 they jumped out to a lead and after scoring 8 runs in the 7th and 8th innings, they secured the series win, and also won the season series.

   But those games showed that there is no quit in that Arizona team, plus they were without two of their best hitters in Christian Walked and Ketel Marte. This is a dangerous team offensively, and on any given day, their pitching can be equally as dangerous. Gallen is clearly their best starting pitcher, but in his career, he has only beaten LA in the regular season once. He is also the only starter with an ERA below 4. 3.55. Kelly has an even worse career against LA, he has never beaten them in the regular season. But both beat LA last year in the playoffs. I would much rather face their third string than those two guys in games that really mean something. 

    Paul Sewald was their closer, but he has been replaced by Justin Martinez who has only blown 1 save. But make no mistake, there are some very good arms in their pen, including Ginkel and Thompson. Let them and the Padres battle it out. Offensively, they are the best in the NL, and they have some boppers in the lineup. Marte leads the team in homers with Suarez and Walker right behind. Pederson is their primary DH and is hitting .282 with 22 bombs. Corbin Carroll seems to have gotten his mojo back and has raised his average to .229. He was well below the Mendoza line going into June. Gurriel Jr provides solid defense and some pop in his bat. Defensively, this is a very good team. What did surprise me is that the Dodgers have actually stolen more and been caught less. 

    So, there is a little info on the teams that at this point could be in the playoffs that the Dodgers would meet in their first round of games this playoff season. They would only face the Phillies if both teams make it to the NLCS. Then for me, it would be time for some payback. Phillies 5-1 against LA this year, and the last couple of times the Dodgers faced them in the playoffs, they have lost. 

                                                                                                   Minor League Scores

                                OKC played the second game of their six-game series against Tacoma and earned a 7-6 win in 10 innings. It is OKC’s next to last series of the year. They have 10 games left in their season. Duplantier started and went 5.0 innings giving up 4 hits, 3 walks and 1 run. He struck out 6. OKC scored 4 in the bottom of the first on 4 hits, one a homer by Trejo, and a three-base error on a hit by Outman. 

                                 Henriquez relieved in the 6th and gave up 1 hit, 4 walks and 2 runs. Gowdy, 1.2 2 hits, 2 walks and a run. Hernandez went 1/3rd of an inning allowing nothing. Feyereisen pitched 1 inning allowing 2 runs on 2 hits and striking out 1 blowing the save. Rooney pitched a clean 10th and got his 4th win. 

                                OKC got 8 hits, Avans, Lipcius and Hoese all had 2 each. Hoese drove in 4 runs. 

                                Jarrod Karros started for Tulsa against Wichita and went 3 clean innings striking out 3. He was followed by Campos who went 4 innings allowing 3 hits a run, a walk and he struck out 7. Suarez pitched a clean 8th, striking out 1. Tulsa rode a 5 run fourth inning to take the lead. They had 5 hits in the inning, 2 of them doubles, and 4 stolen bases including a steal of home. 

                               Wichita shut them down after that. Wichita scored 2 in the bottom of the 9th, for a 5-3 final. 

                                     Arizona won big again against the Rangers, but both Az and the Dodgers have Thursday off as LA heads for a wrap-around 4 game series in Atlanta. The Dodgers simply need to take care of their own business and not watch the scoreboard. As long as they keep winning, it does not matter what the other teams do. San Diego lost to the Mariners. The Dodgers did what they had to do, but it wasn’t pretty, and it was far from easy. They scored a run in the 7th and 2 in the 8th on Edman’s second homer of the game, his 4th in two days. The lead stays at five over Arizona and they now lead the Padres by 5.5. Kopech, who is usually pretty good, walked 3 batters in the 9th allowing a run without a hit. He threw 22 pitches, only 8 were strikes. But he got the save, and Vesia got his 3rd win. Kopech’s save was his 13th. Day off for travel to Atlanta.  Dodgers will pitch Knack Friday versus Schwellenbach. Flaherty gets Sale on Saturday, Buehler against Morton on Sunday, and Yamamoto faces off with Fried on Monday. Critical four game series. By the way, the home plate umpire tonight, Manny Gonzalez, seriously needs his eyes checked. He was atrocious.