Dodgers Giants Game 4 Preview

Here we are, at the last game between the Dodgers and Giants until next April.

Mike Bolsinger was, one again, not good last night. He’s given up exactly three earned runs in four of his last five starts, but has only reached five innings once in that span. To paraphrase Dennis Green, he is who we thought he is. Fine pitching depth. A guy that’s stretched out enough to get a spot start. If a team gets destroyed by injuries, like the Dodgers did, he can come in and fill in and maybe not always be an automatic loss. He was so good early on this season and really kept the rotation solidified after Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke. If he’s a major part of the future, I will be worried. But as pitching depth and a guy who could maybe turn into a fifth starter, he’s perfectly fine.

The offense was also stifled by Mike Leake, who finished with a semi-similar statline. Like Kershaw the night before, Leake pitched a CGSO. He threw 105 pitches, while Kershaw needed 104. He allowed two whole hits, while Kershaw allowed one. Of course, Kershaw struck out 12 more batters than Leake did, but hey. Leake pitched great, the Dodgers were probably still recovering from the night before. It happens.

If you’re complaining about the lineup the Dodgers sent out there, don’t. I was expecting so much worse. The fact that Ronald Torreyes, Chris Heisey, Justin Ruggiano and Scott Schebler weren’t in the lineup was a huge surprise for me. This is literally the lineup the Blue Jays, who clinched yesterday and are currently a game up in the race for home field in the AL, are using today.

DARWIN BARNEY!

Brett Anderson gets his 31st start for the Dodgers. He will, in all likelihood, set a new career high in innings pitched today. He’s been pretty solid all season, but has understandable started to wear down down the stretch, which puts his postseason status up in the air, unlike the batted balls against him.

Flawless segue. Anderson currently has a 65.9 percent ground ball rate, which is the highest since old friend Derek Lowe got 67 percent of batters to ground out in 2006. Unfortunately, Anderson also owns the second highest HR/FB rate in baseball this year, only .1 percent better than that of James Shields. Anderson has still been solid this season and if he gets more money next year from another team, it’s well deserved. He made more starts than anyone probably expected him to make this year and brought his A+ twitter sense of humor to the team, so let’s hope he goes off on a high note.

I know it’s sacrilegious to say something nice about a Giant, but today is the final start of Tim Hudson‘s career and that makes me really sad. I’ve been a Dodger fan forever, but I began to love baseball as a whole by watching the Hudson/Barry Zito/Mark Mulder A’s teams. It’s really sad that this might be the last season any of them pitch. So in a way, I hope Hudson has a strong outing today (and then the bullpen can come in and the Dodgers can win).

Nothing too weird here. Despite his noodle-arm, Chase Utley has looked good enough in his two other starts at third.

First pitch is scheduled for 12:45 PST and will be shown on Sportsnet LA.