Thursday, August 30, 2007 - Officially Back in the Race(s)
KENT IS CONGRATULATED AFTER SCORING WINNING RUN!
With yesterday’s win, we are officially back in the race(s). We are 3.5 games back in both the Division and Wild Card Races. Yesterday’s win was unusual, in that Furcal and Pierre were 1-12 and neither one scored a run, yet we won. Kemp hit the ball hard and supplied a HR, but Kent, Martin, Loney & Hillenbrand supplied the RBI power. Penny was simply horrible. Let’s hope that was an anomaly, but his Post-All Star ERA is up to 3.20 after being 2.39 Pre-All Star. Hendrickson had his 1st bad outing out of the pen, but Beimel, Broxton and Saito were nails. No way we win that game with the grit of Scott Proctor, however. He provided 3 innings of shutout ball and got his 3rd win as a Dodger. Martin is on track for .297/21 HR/36 Doubles/26 SB - we can’t ask much more from him.
Before yesterday’s game Ned acquired Esteban Loaiza in a waiver deal where no players were involved. We just get the privilege of paying him about $8 million. It’s a risk, but there wasn’t much out there to choose from and it’s good to see that he is flat-out loathe to trade the youngsters and that Dodger Brass still believe we can win - this year! Beyond this year, this deal signals the end of Randy Wolf’s Dodger career, unless he wants to become a relief specialist for a whole lot less money. You can never have too many starters are we have seen this year. With Clayton Kershaw a good bet to make the team at some point next year, we should have the following pitchers available for the rotation: Jason Schmidt, Esteban Loaiza, Brad Penny, Derek Lowe, Chad Billingsley, Clayton Kershaw and even James McDonald and Scott Elbert. I like our future, but would like it even more if we had signed Hochevar and Blair! I still say those were bonehead moves.
Yesterday, I read a well-argued blog that said Ned was not a risk-taker and that we wouldn’t win as long as he was unwilling to take risks. Part of his argument was based upon the “year” Jason Werth had last week. Werth has always been hut and likely always will be, yet he thinks Ned was scared to pay him a few hundred thousand dollars. That is flat-out crazy! It was well-argued and flat-out flawed in it’s thinking. The same writer who would criticize him for failure to pull off trades is the same writer who would flog him for trading away the farm. Unless you have ran a company it is difficult to understand how deals go down. Many fans have said that Ned should have gotten more for players, based upon what they think that player is worth, but there is a lot we don’t know. What we do know is that whenever a GM from another team is approached by Ned for a trade, they are always asking for one or multiple Top Prospects, whereas they might ask for less from another team. Ned has taken risks. He signed Nomar, Schmidt, Wolf, Gonzo and Kent - all players who were injury prone or getting up in age, or both. He got Tomko and Hendrickson and many other role players without trading away our core of young talent. He got Ethier and Betemit whom he traded for Proctor (the jury is out), and Saito, Seanez, Tsao, Hillenbrand, Pierre, Sweeney and Martinez - some of which have been busts, BUT HE DIDN’T TRADE OUR CORE! So, anyone who presents a well articulated blog about how he’s no risk taker is just devoid of reason or don’t want to be confused with the facts because their mind is already made up.
The upcoming series with the Padres that begins on Friday and is FLAT-OUT the biggest series of the year for us. In fact, we need to sweep it to really be in a good position. I predict that Milton Bradley will double in his first at-bat and that he will mouth off to Jeff Kent, who will kick his ass on the field. This will catapult to Dodgers into a hitting frenzy and lead to the Series Sweep!
REQUIRED READING:
1. Loaiza Acquired; More; Ditto
2. Game Recap; More; Again
3. Jeff Kent
4. Depth Chart
MINOR LEAGUE REPORT:
LAS VEGAS 51’s - Won 6-3 - Abreu 2-4; LaRoche 1-4; Hu -1-4; Young 2-3
JACKSONVILLE SUNS - Won 8-6 - Raglani ht his 21st HR, a Grand Salami; Greg Miller Started- 4 IP/2 ER/6 H/3 BB/7 K’s
INLAND EMPIRE 66′ers - Won 2-1 - May with his 22nd Double
GREAT LAKES LOONS - Won 7-5 - Figueroa got the win with 3.2 IP/5 BB/7 K’s - Mattingly 3-5 (.218)
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Next Game: Fri., August 31 @ 7:05 p.m. PT/10:05 EDT |
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