Dodgers: Joc Pederson hitting clutch homers against LAD in October feels so wrong

Remember when we said the Los Angeles Dodgers shouldn’t be worrying about their former players dominating during October?

We take it back. Because it’s now directly affecting them, and if the Boston Red Sox make it to the World Series as the Dodgers’ potential opponent, you can bet Kiké Hernandez’s insane hot streak will affect them in some unthinkable capacity.

But on Sunday night in NLCS Game 2 against the Atlanta Braves, it was old friend Joc Pederson who tattooed an offering from ace Max Scherzer into the right field seats. The two-run homer tied the game and brought the Truist Park crowd back into it.

In 64 career postseason games with the Dodgers, Pederson cranked nine October homers, with each one seemingly carrying a greater magnitude. In two career postseason games against the Dodgers, Pederson has one under his belt. And it feels so wrong.

Joc Pederson homered against the Dodgers in the postseason and it’s … really weird.

There’s still plenty of time left in this game, but the former Dodgers slugger just made LA pay in a colossal manner, especially with the way Game 1 ended. Not to mention, the offense has already squandered four opportunities with runners in scoring position early in Game 2, so one could argue this homer shouldn’t have had the impact that it did.

Mad Max needs more run support, especially on the road. The Dodgers can’t be in danger of losing a second quality postseason outing of his. That’s a recipe for playoff disaster, even if they have three upcoming home games and have the longstanding mental edge over the Braves after last year’s 3-1 comeback in the NLCS.

Oof. That hurts even more too. Right now, we’d sure love a bad mother f—er to crank a clutch hit or homer, but instead the Dodgers are batting .207 with a .594 OPS with runners in scoring position this October. That’s not sustainable with the task likely to get harder against either the high-powered Houston Astros or the Boston Red Sox, who lead MLB in just about every imaginable offensive category in the playoffs.

Joc was our guy. This was supposed to be our clutch blast. Someone get in touch with Pederson’s jeweler. Put a set of pearls on one of the Dodgers’ power hitters.

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