Dodgers’ offense struggling through June gloom

Last night the Dodgers dropped their third consecutive game, which now extends their losing streak to five of their last seven.

Nationals’ ace Max Scherzer simply dominated the Dodgers on Tuesday night striking out 14 in seven strong innings, capping off a 2-1 victory and confirming a series win for Washington. Despite the series loss, Dave Roberts should not be disappointed in the starting pitching during the series as Brandon McCarthy and Hyun-Jin Ryu each pitched seven innings, keeping the club in both games.

What is more concerning is the that Dodgers’ offense has scored less than two runs in six of their last seven games, including being shutout twice. Unfortunately, as great as the month of May was, June has not started off to a great start for the boys in blue as they now have a 2-4 record after the first week of June.

The Dodgers went from being one of the best offenses in May to the worst in June. The club owns a league-worst .175 batting average with a very pedestrian 15 runs scored, which is largely inflated by a 10-8 win against Milwaukee. The Dodgers currently have a slash rate of .175/.254/.262 with 69 strikeouts second only to the Brewers who are the only team the Dodgers have beat this month.

The boys in blue are clearly struggling at the plate. After closing out May winning eight out of their final ten games, the offense has had a difficult time making contact and getting on base since the flip of the calendar. Currently, the Dodgers only have two players hitting above .300 (Chris Taylor and Yasiel Puig) during June, with five of the regular starters each hitting under the Mendoza line.

Chase Utley, Corey Seager, Yasmani Grandal, Kike Hernandez, and Logan Forsythe collectively have 10 hits in 91 at-bats. That translates to a .109 batting average for four everyday starters and a player who’s seen action in nearly every game (Hernandez).

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When looking at the starting pitchers the club has faced, there’s nothing really that blatantly catches the eye. The team has faced some solid pitchers, but outside of Scherzer last night, no one who is really elite. Yet pitchers like Adam Wainwright (shutout), Jimmy Nelson (11 strikeouts), Zack Davies (shutout) have all had success against the Dodgers leading right up to, Max Scherzer’s 14 strikeouts performance last night.

Optimistically I’d like to say that the team is not at full strength, with Justin Turner being out since May 19th. But realistically, the Dodgers have held their own while he’s been out and this is really the first time since his injury that the Dodgers’ offense has sputtered.

For the exception of Turner and Joc Pederson, the Dodgers offense, including Adrian Gonzalez, are relatively healthy. Gonzalez should not be to blame for the club’s offensive struggles as he has a solid .278 average with two extra base hits. It’s not world-breaking, but it’s the production we’ve come to expect from Gonzalez on the wrong side of thirty.

It’s difficult to see Joc Pederson’s absence playing a huge role to team’s slump because when he was on the field he wasn’t producing and Chris Taylor has been more than a competent replacement.

When I watch the games, I see a team that needs to fix their approach at the plate. It happens so often that Dodger hitters come up to the plate and are looking to hit a towering home run rather than take a situational at-bat. In the last seven games, the club is 5 – 50 with runners in scoring position.

The team is struggling to manufacture runs, and that’s surprising because they had done so well during May. But at-bat after at-bat we continue to see hitters swinging for the fences, which leads to a lot of empty contact, which is why we see these high strikeout numbers. The Dodgers are currently on pace to break a franchise record that they set last season with the most strikeouts in a single season (projected 1,400 team strikeouts).

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The Dodgers went down a similar path at the beginning of April. They were able to figure it out and had their best month the following month. Cody Bellinger and Chris Taylor were a big reason to the spark in the Dodger offense. With Justin Turner on the mends of returning possibly by this weekend, let’s wait and see if J.T. can spark this Dodgers offense in the right direction.