The Dodgers and Angels weren’t supposed to be fielding questions over potential of missing the playoffs at this point in the season, but late-summer swoons have intensified a crisis in confidence for Los Angeles’s major-league clubs, setting up a roller-coaster ride entering September stretch run.
The Dodgers were picked to win a third straight NL West title rather easily, but the San Francisco Giants’ dynasty has continued to play the annoying fly during what was supposed to be an off year. Now that the Chicago Cubs have raced away with the fifth wild-card spot during an 18-6 August, that use-only-in-case-of-emergency playoff slot seems less available to LA’s National League club.
None of that is good for an in-between team like the Dodgers. With celebrity owners who ponied up over $2bn for the franchise, and spent possibly over $300m on the 2015 payroll, they are clearly in a win-now situation. However, they’re also very much about the future, with a farm system that’s among the most stacked in baseball. Interestingly, this all comes together just as the front office transitions from the more old-school organizational approach of Ned Colletti to the more modern and progressive tack of president Andrew Freidman and general manager Farhan Zaidi, a Billy Beane disciple.
The result is something of a jumble, one that certainly has talent but that’s also overpriced, imbalanced and incomplete: it’s a roster situation will likely rectify itself as Freidman and Zaidi get more time to shape the promising foundation they inherited. For now however, there is considerable pressure on Don Mattingly to get this mix to the World Series, something he’s failed to do the previous two seasons.
A recent five-game slide was topped and tailed with walk-off losses and bridged by a no-hitter. Clayton Kershaw has already publicly fired the panic button and Mattingly was smart enough to quickly back his plea for playing with urgency. Starting pitching remains a problem behind Kershaw and Greinke (...then reach for your hanky?), one that really hasn’t been completely solved since LA lost third starter Hyun-Jin Ryu to shoulder surgery and Brandon McCarthy to a torn UCL at the start of the season.
Brett Anderson has pitched well, but his numbers would’ve looked a lot better as a fourth starter. Mat Latos and Alex Wood were acquired at the deadline to try and solidify the stating staff: Wood has been uneven, while an ineffective Latos has been sent to the bullpen.
You may wonder why LA didn’t go out and get David Price or Cole Hamels at the trade deadline? After all, if you’re going to spend $300m, why the heck not tack on a bit more salary? Well, that’s probably more to do with the uniqueness of this win-now/hold on to your prospects and wait for tomorrow situation revealing itself. So Mattingly is employing a four-man rotation for the next few weeks to try and maximize the number of turns Greinke and Kershaw get.
Unfortunately, that $300m doesn’t secure you a bullpen – LA are ranked 13 of 15 NL teams in ERA, with the relief core representing the teams greatest stumbling block. Club brass have been accelerating their pitching prospects in the minors in a bid to make some of their young guns available for relief work when rosters expand in September. What fans really want to see is Julio Urias, a 19-year-old lefty phenom, a top-five prospect across all baseball currently pitching in Double-A. Mattingly said this week he wouldn’t be called up initially, but could possibly emerge in the middle of next month if needed.
Offensively, they’re a boom or bust outfit, pacing the NL in home runs with eight players in double-digit dingers. Still, they are seriously lacking in other ways to score, which could hurt if they make the playoffs and face elite pitching. All-Star rookie sensation and strikeout machine Joc Pederson has been demoted, while second baseman Howie Kendrick remains out with a hamstring injury, one that forced brass to acquire Chase Utley. Yasiel Puig’s hamstring is still a cause for concern, but he’s still showing signs over the past two weeks of re-emerging as that big piece while Adrian Gonzalez has hit just three home runs this month.
Not that LA needed any hitting on Thursday – Zack Greinke required just a single run to help the Dodgers win 1-0, making it three straight wins against the horrendous Cincinnati Reds and improving their August record to 12-11. Is their latest rebound for real? Serious tests start on Friday at Dodger Stadium when the Cubs and Giants come to town for six crucial contests.
Meanwhile the Angels have seen their playoff probabilities slide from over 90% just over a month ago, to just a smidgen over 38% as the Houston Astros pull away in the AL West and a host of AL teams contend for the wild card spot. A year after the Angels somehow – and I’ve never really been able to figure this out – won 98 games, the franchise has experienced a tumultuous campaign, one featuring their diabolical and disgraceful handling of the Josh Hamilton situation and a power struggle between manager Mike Scioscia and now former general manager Jerry Dipoto. Considering the mud that the ballclub managed to drag itself through this season, a fair few neutral fans may be pleased to see the Angels struggle while winning just 10 of 25 games as we enter a critical stage.
Of course, such a slide makes sense when you consider their abysmal offense, one that ranks 14th in the AL in OPS, 13th in slugging percentage and 13th in on-base percentage. Actually, considering the way they swing the bat, it’s probably appropriate to ask ‘What took so long?’ in evaluating the Angles struggles. It’s been the Mike Trout and Albert Pujols show all season long, with few of the supporting cast besides Kole Calhoun contributing. Pujols continues to experience that slight upward bounce that followed five consecutive seasons of decline, so maybe he does remain productive until 2021 – the year through which he’s incomprehensibly under contract. So far recent acquisitions outfielders David Murphy, Shane Victorino and David DeJesus haven’t moved the needle, while Trout has had what’s probably the worst month of his charmed career since hurting his wrist in late July.
The starters have some live arms in Hector Santiago and Garrett Richards, but losing CJ Wilson to bone spurs, an ailment which foolishly caused some Angels teammates to question his toughness, was a blow. There is nothing special at all about the bulk of the Angels rotation, especially with Jered Weaver, now back, struggling with his velocity. The bullpen is decent, with Joe Smith and Huston Street closing out games, but is it enough to carry an unexpectedly sagging offense?
If Trout manages to get healthy, they will have just as good a chance as other incomplete teams in the running for the fifth spot, that being the Texas Rangers, Baltimore Orioles, Minnesota Twins, Tampa Bay Rays. The schedule is tough: seven with the Rangers, including the final series of the year in Texas, six with Houston, four with the Twins, and three games next week against the Dodgers. If Trout can’t recover from his slump, a season already looking lost for LA seems destined to slip further into the abyss.
