LOS ANGELES_The silence irritated Kenley Jansen. In the hours before thousands of spectators fill a baseball stadium, the ballpark can feel eerie or serene. It depends how your team is playing. On Saturday afternoon, as batting practice unfolded for a collection of Los Angeles Dodgers who had lost twice as many games as they'd won in 2018, Jansen hollered in the general vicinity of the folks running Dodger Stadium's speaker system.
"I promise we'll play better!" Jansen shouted. "I promise! We need some music! I promise we'll go 42-8 today!"
His words would ring hollow, but Jansen could not know that yet, in the afternoon before a 9-1 defeat to the Arizona Diamondbacks. A minute later, as the opening bars of Carnage's "WDYW" clanged over the diamond, Jansen and Justin Turner pointed skyward, in search of more volume. The stadium attendants obliged. At long last, the Dodgers had done something right this season.
Success at actual baseball has proved elusive, a reality clarified by Saturday's thrashing. The heights of 2017 _ the blissful stretch of 43-7 baseball during the summer, the tenacity of their run to the World Series _ feel like dispatches from eons ago. The name on the front of the jersey is the same, and almost all the names on the back are the same. The product is far different.
Anemic at the plate, imprecise on the mound and indifferent on the field, the Dodgers (4-9) produced a trifecta of unsightly baseball Saturday evening. The calendar still features 24 more weeks of games, enough time for the team to rediscover the ballast that sustained them last season. Yet the calendar also serves as a taunt: Can you imagine watching five more months like this?
In losing for the third game in a row, the Dodgers could not bother an opponent with a wounded pitching staff and Rich Hill could not pacify his guests. Hill gave up seven runs in five innings _ and it would have been worse if Arizona not been docked a run for a bizarre gaffe on the bases. Trying to fit in, Wilmer Font surrendered a pair of home runs in the eighth and ninth inning.
At the plate, the Dodgers remain hapless. Unlike Friday, when the team attempted a comeback through a series of well-placed grounders, the offense mounted little challenge, even after Arizona starter Taijuan Walker left the game with tightness in his right forearm. Sent to replace Walker, Diamondbacks left-handed reliever T.J. McFarland spun four innings of two-hit baseball.
Arizona has now defeated the Dodgers in 11 consecutive regular-season games, a statistic that does not account for the Dodgers' three-game sweep in the National League division series. It is the longest string of futility against one opponent in franchise history.
An answer to the team's woes appears elusive. The problems are widespread, a virus Clayton Kershaw cannot solve on his own when he starts the series finale against Arizona on Sunday. Alex Wood wobbled Wednesday, Kenta Maeda unraveled Friday and Hill imploded Saturday. The team's best hitter, Turner, has yet to take batting practice as he recovers from a fractured wrist. The best hitter in triple-A Oklahoma City, Andrew Toles, injured his hamstring Friday.
Another ailment Saturday added to the team's issues. Logan Forsythe exited the game after experiencing discomfort in his right shoulder. Forsythe has hit .174 this season. But with Turner on the shelf, Forsythe was also the team's most reliable defender at third base.
The Dodgers pulled ahead in the second inning. They were facing a familiar, vulnerable foe. The team pummeled Walker in the first game of the 2017 playoffs, and he came to the park with a 4.91 ERA in five regular-season outings against the Dodgers.
Walker lasted two innings on Saturday. His final frame began with a leadoff double from Yasiel Puig, who deposited a fastball into left field and hustled into second base ahead of the throw. The next batter, Joc Pederson, grounded a full-count splitter up the middle for an RBI single.
The lead did not survive the top of the third. Hill had retired eight of the first nine batters he faced before issuing a two-out walk to outfielder David Peralta. Next was shortstop Ketel Marte, who smoked a curveball into the right-center gap. Peralta jetted home to tie the game.
Paul Goldschmidt then hammered a 2-2 fastball for a two-run homer that curled around the left-field pole and landed in the second deck.
The two-out flurry infuriated Hill. He stomped off the mound and grabbed a bat. He smashed the lumber against the dugout seats and disappeared from sight. The outburst did not guarantee better pitching upon his return.
In the fourth, Hill benefited from a rare event _ a batter passing a teammate after hitting a home run. After a leadoff double by outfielder Chris Owings and a walk by catcher Alex Avila, Hill served up an 88.7-mph fastball for third baseman Devin Marrero. The subsequent drive made rain before descending behind the fence in left-center field.
It looked like a three-run homer. Except as the ball hung in the air, Avila waited in the bases, unable to read the trajectory. Marrero passed his teammate by accident. The Dodgers challenged the call. The umpires ruled Marrero out, and credited him with a two-run single.
