Dodgers: LA’s Six Game Losing Streak Was “Healthy”

The Los Angeles Dodgers finally snapped their six-game losing streak with a 7-1 win over the Milwaukee Brewers to close out the series.  Before which, their last win came a full week ago in Colorado.  While it’s shocking that they could start the 2019 season going 8-2 before dropping 6 straight, it’s not necessarily a terrible thing, if anything it’s healthy.

Yes, the pitching has been poor.  They’ve all consistently been falling behind in the count to batters, forcing them to give up better pitches to opponents.  Additionally, the starting pitchers haven’t been lasting long into games which is taxing the bullpen.  The bullpen, in turn, has been less effective and giving up leads.

Manager Dave Roberts has not been immune to the mistakes either.  On Friday, Roberts could’ve built Joe Kelly’s confidence by removing him after a scoreless inning, but instead, he marched him out to start another.  Kelly went on to give up 3 hits and another run.

Again Saturday, in his second inning of work, Dennis Santana was allowed to load the bases by hitting a batter, giving up a hit, and walking another batter before giving up a 2-run single.  Roberts was prepared to pinch hit for him the inning prior so there is no reason the bullpen shouldn’t have had someone warm to bail Santana out after he hit the batter or gave up the single.

While the offense has been pretty decent through 17 games, averaging 6.4 runs per game, they are not without their share of blame too.  It’s well known that the Dodgers are not exactly a small ball team, but during the 6-game slide, situational hitting took a back burner.

The first ten games of the season the Dodgers were averaging .8 sacrifice bunts as well as .8 sacrifice flies per game, but during the losing streak, they were averaging just .3 sacrifice bunts and .3 sacrifice flies.  Walks were also down from 5.6 per game to 2.8, while strikeouts climbed from averaging 7 per game to 8.3 during the slide.

While the losing streak was snapped today behind some good offense and an outstanding start from Ross Stripling, the losing streak was never anything to be very concerned about.  As familiar as this team seems to be, there are new faces, new personalities, and some injuries they need to be worked through.

These are the growing pains of a new season, the micro failures that success is built upon.  You want the team to experience something like this early.  It teaches them what they can overcome together.  These are the good struggles, the struggles that bond the team together as they learn to persevere as a team.

Vin Scully once said, “Be a bobbed cork: when you are pushed down, bob up.”

Seventeen games into the 2019 season, the Dodgers have already been tested mentally and physically.  The good news is, at no point in time was there anything that resembled defeat being shown from this them, only fight.  The Dodgers will, without a doubt, have more tests this season, but having already been cast into the fire, they are ready for it.