Dodgers: What the Dodgers lose with Alex Verdugo out

The Dodgers will likely be without Alex Verdugo for the NLDS if not all of the postseason.  The impact of Dugie being out will be bigger than expected.

Entering the second to last week of the regular season, Alex Verdugo remains shut down for the Dodgers.  There has not been anything encouraging regarding his back/oblique injury that began all the way back in May.  Dugie is already likely to miss the National League Division Series and a return after that remains in question.

While the Dodgers have the depth to fill in for Verdugo with another talented rookie such as Matt Beaty, there is not another rookie on the team who can offer the skillset that Alex does.  The skill the Dodgers will miss most is his outfield defense.  Verdugo is a plus defender no matter where he plays in the outfield with his best spot being left field where he has a UZR/150 rating of 38.1 in 128 1/3 innings.

The loss of Verdugo is the primary reason that Cody Bellinger is now back in centerfield.  A.J. Pollock had become a liability in center and is now the club’s starting left fielder where he has graded out much better.  If Verdugo was healthy, the Dodgers would have left Bellinger in right field and help take some of his workload off defensively.  Now, Belli is responsible for leading the offense and manning the toughest outfield position.

Even if the Dodgers used an outfield alignment of Pollock-Bellinger-Pederson during the postseason, if Verdugo was available he could have came off the bench to improve the outfield defense in the late innings.  Late inning defense could make the difference as we witnessed last year in game seven of the NLCS when Chris Taylor made a game saving catch.  That is the kind of defensive impact that Verdugo may have had.

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Outside of his stellar defense, Verdugo also brought a contact bat to a lineup that is full of strikeout prone sluggers.  Dugie struck out in just 13% of his at-bats during the 2019 season and would have been an excellent bat off the bench if he did not start.  Matt Beaty can provide a contact first pinch-hitter but he lacks the defense that Verdugo provides.

There have been plenty of pinch-hit opportunities in the last two World Series runs where the Dodgers brought a hitter in to pinch-hit and they struck when a simple fly ball or base hit would have driven a run in.  This is the kind of scenario where having Alex available off the bench could have paid dividends.

In recent games the Dodgers have gone back to platoon type lineups as Jack Dorfman explained earlier today.  Verdugo hit .327 against southpaw pitching with an OPS of .843.  That is better than his .281 average against right-handed pitching and .807 OPS against righties.  Verdugo would have meant less platoon lineups.

Although the Dodgers still have a very good outfield without Alex Verdugo, the club would have been better with him even if he was in a reserve role for the NLDS and the rest of the postseason.  His loss certainly hurts, but hopefully the Dodgers don’t end up missing him too much this October.