The Dodgers seem to be in early December form in their first two spring games.
The Dodgers are done with playing the Cubs in Spring. The only two “for sure” opening day roster pitchers who pitched in the first two games were Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Tony Gonsolin. Both pitchers pitched well in their early spring games. Gonsolin looked particularly sharp against the Cubs “A” players. With his splitter looking especially sharp for having not pitched in 18 months.
AAA starting pitchers who will get MLB time this year that pitched were Landon Knack, Ben Casparius, Bobby Miller, and Justin Wrobleski. Casparius and Knack look like they could make the roster heading to Tokyo, but both figure to be primary AAA SP.
Casparius was hurt by some poor CF defense by Andy Pages, followed by some lazy running to the misplayed ball. As Rick Monday said, it is one thing to misplay a ball hit right at you, which can happen in the mid-day Arizona sun, but when you jog back to a ball hit over your head you just gave up 90 feet.
The Dodgers signed several AAAA pitchers in the offseason, most had inauspicious outings in the first two games: Justin Jarvis, Giovanny Gallegos, Matt Sauer, Jose E. Hernandez, Sam Carlson, Luis Garcia, and Joe Jacques. With a limited number of opportunities in a short spring buildup, each outing is important. At some point, the LAD bullpen regulars are going to need to get their innings in, meaning these journeymen AAAA pitchers will need to be reassigned to MiLB camp and generally out of sight of MLB scouts, LAD and others.
Of that group, only Gallegos looked to be effective, and should get some additional MLB opportunities. The others? Organizational depth or released.
The Dodgers home grown group of relief pitchers who took the mound in one of the two games pitched well: Ryan Sublette, Antonio Knowles, Jack Dreyer, Carlos Duran, and Chris Campos. Combined, the five pitchers pitched 4.1 innings. They allowed 0 runs, on 2 singles, 0 BB, and registered 4 K.
The pitching probably met the Dodgers expectations. At least they did not show too much to Chicago.
The ABS was not in effect this game. On a pitch to Kiké Hernández in the 2nd inning, Kiké believed a pitch that was called a strike was a ball, and he tapped his head to call for a pitch challenge. Jim Wolf, the plate umpire, had to tell Kiké that there were no challenges on the day. As it turned out, the pitch was a strike.
Another observation, the Dodgers home grown position players do not appear to be MLB ready, with the exception of Hunter Feduccia. Dalton Rushing looks overwhelmed at the plate. Nerves? We can hope. The role players that are at least showing signs of life, include David Bote, Eddie Rosario, and Chris Okey. The remaining home growns, Austin Gauthier, Zyhir Hope, Josue De Paula, Ryan Ward, Kody Hoese, Sean McLain, Griffin Lockwood-Powell, Kyle Nevin, and Justin Dean do not appear to be ready. There is still high hopes for Hope and De Paula. The others? Organizational depth.
Defense? P*** poor over the two games. Any ball hit in the air is an adventure for Ryan Ward. Zyhir Hope again showed a poor read and break on a ball, this time in RF. Andy Pages has still not learned how to play CF. He displayed some Alex Verdugo like laziness, but I do not remember that being part of his game before, so I am not going to brand him another Alex Verdugo. But he is going to need to learn to play hard on every play. Physical errors happen. Mental errors should not.
Justin Dean had another nice play in CF. But he has to hit to even be considered a 4th OF. Here is a 2021 Prospects Live scouting report on Dean.
https://www.prospectslive.com/scoutingreports/justin-dean
The Dodgers hit into 3 more double plays, were 3-10 WRISP, 15 men left on base, and 11 more K’s. For the two games, the Dodgers hit into 7 DP, 3-14 WRISP, 22 men left on base, and 22 K’s.
Mookie, Miggy Ro, Austin Barnes, CT3, and Okey each had 2 hits, with Chris Okey hitting a 2-run HR.
Nick Frasso starts for LAD against KC on Saturday. No word on when Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow, Roki Sasaki, and Dustin May will pitch.
The game is at Camelback, so the ABS will be in effect again.
CT3 with 2 knocks
Spring games are what they are, dress rehearsals for the scrubs. I am more into what the regulars do. After the game, I watched Ohtani’s three homer performance to reach 50/50 again. Great game to watch. Kersh is just 32 K’s away from becoming the first Dodger ever to record 3000 strikeouts. All as a Dodger. Scherzer got # 3000 while a Dodger and that was fun to watch. Betts is 29 homers from 300. Freeman is 7 away from 350. Ohtani is 25 away from 250. Teo is 8 away from 200. So, some milestones can be reached this year. Do you guys realize that Tyler Glasnow has just 5 more career wins than Tony Gonsolin? Miller has one more career win than May. Walker Buehler will reach 50 career wins if he wins 3 games with the Red Sox. Walker is wearing number 0 for the Sox.
Offense will be there when the time comes. Defense? It would appear the Dodgers don’t stress it much. I don’t believe they have since Alston managed the club.
I know I keep saying this but for me bears repeating. I learned early, Little League I think, that throwing overhand from ALL defensive positions is important because backspin throws fly straighter and create truer straight ahead bounces that are easier to field. Sidearm throws spin sideways which fades and creates a sideways bounce. It’s a little thing that good coaches catch early. Betts continues to throw sidearm from shortstop and I’m telling you if he keeps that up there will be accuracy issues going forward. Bend the knees, field the ball with proper mechanics, stand up straight, throw an overhand strike to first. The only exception to that are quick, short throws to get a force at second.
Betts throwing like a second baseman?