MidValleySports.Com

By Those Deferred BenchWarmers

The Dodgers capped off their road trip with a 5-1 victory over the Royals, completing a 5-1 trip. They remain tied with the Detroit Tigers for the best record in baseball, and are inching towards taking the lead on run differential. The Weekend in Review
Headline for the Weekend: High Fives All Around as Dodgers Defeat Royals 

Results: The Dodgers trailed in each game of the series and scored five times in each game of the series. It was just enough in game 1 (5-4), not nearly enough in game 2 (9-5), and more than enough in game 3 (5-1). 

Pitching Analysis: Dustin May struggled in game 1, but the Dodger bullpen held the Royals scoreless after the Dodgers regained the lead. The 9th inning was stress-inducing, but Freddie Freeman (perfect on pick attempts on bad throws this year), dug out Mookie Betts’ throw from second to complete the double play and end the game. 

Shohei Ohtani reached over 101 MPH in game 2, throwing two scoreless innings as he makes his way back to full time pitching. The stuff has been electric and the progress strong so far. Ben Casparius and Luis Garcia were lit up for 12 hits and 9 runs, with the latter DFA’d on Sunday. 

Game three was all about Justin Wrobleski, who pitched six strong innings in relief. He struck out six and only allowed four baserunners (3 hits, 1 walk). Removing his first appearance this year (an 8-2 loss in April to Washington), Wrobleski has pitched 30.1 innings, with 30 strikeouts and only six walks. He has an ERA of only 2.37 during that span. 
  
Hitting Analysis: Last article, we mentioned that the Royals had one of the better pitching staffs in all of baseball, and it showed this series. The Dodgers were relatively held in check, as evidenced by their limited opportunities with runners in scoring position (only two in game one, and three in game three). The difference was in the Dodgers situational/clutch/timely hitting. Two thirds of the Dodger runs this series scored with two outs, with the Dodgers hitting a strong 6 for 14 (.428) with runners in scoring position. Their worst performance in that was game 2, where they still got a hit in one-third of those types of situations. 

Kiké Hernandez was super important this series, as he was involved with a third of the runs that scored during the series. 

The concerning trends: Mookie Betts had one hit the entire series, Teoscar Hernandez and Michael Conforto each had none. 
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Takeaway for the Weekend: The Bench has played very well overall for the Dodgers. The numbers may not back everything individually, but the fact that Will Smith feels as good as he does, there’s a strong push by the fanbase for a rookie to get more playing time, and the positive contributions of Kiké are seen and felt reveals how strong the bench has become this year.

Burning Question (And Attempted Answer): What’s Next for the Dodgers in July? The Dodgers started June slowly, dropping five of their first seven games. Since then, the Dodgers have gone 15-5, including two separate five game winning streaks. We expect a solid showing throughout July, more in tune with the recent twenty games. Once the pitching staff begins to come back and the hitters start to find their groove, this team will be great. 

Next Series’ Preview: The Dodgers return home to face the White Sox for a three game series to kick off July. 

Analysis: This will be the first series since the middle of June (against the Giants) that the Dodgers will not have an opener/bullpen game. The fact that it’s against the hapless White Sox only reinforces the fact that’ll be imperative for the Dodger rotation to set the tone and do well. 

What to Look For: Clayton Kershaw is three strikeouts from three thousand. Enough said.