Nationals at Dodgers, 12:10 PM PDT, TV: MASN 2, SPNLA
LHP Patrick Corbin (4-13, 6.02 ERA) tries to finish a sweep of the Dodgers while LHP Andrew Heaney (1-0, 0.59 ERA) tries to prevent it. Corbin’s performance has fallen off a cliff and no one seems to know why. Since the start of the 2020 season, Corbin has a 5.61 ERA in 337 innings. There are lots of theories but no answers. His contract has now become a source of speculation: should he and it be added to any trade of Juan Soto, as the Red Sox added David Price to the Mookie Betts deal?
Heaney, meanwhile, is coming off a long stretch on the IL with shoulder discomfort. Before it occurred, he had shown the Dodgers that offering him a one-year contract last fall might pan out. He’d made two starts in April, going 10 1/3 innings and giving up just 4 hits and one run.
Today in Dodgers’ history:
- 1918 In his major league debut, Robins (Dodgers) starter Harry Heitman, after giving up hits to four consecutive batters in a 22-7 loss to the Cardinals, is pulled from the Ebbets Field contest. The 21 year-old Brooklyn rookie right-hander will never hurl again in the big leagues, ending his career with an ERA of infinity.
- 1959 The Continental League is formally announced, with franchises located in Denver, Houston, Minneapolis-St. Paul, New York City, and Toronto. The concept of the new major league is the brainchild of William Shea, an attorney who proposed the idea a year after the Giants and Dodgers left New York City to move to the West Coast.
- 1966 Sandy Koufax strikes out 16 Phillies and Jim Bunning whiffs 12 Dodgers in the first 11 innings of a pitching duel between future Hall of Famers at Chavez Ravine. With both starters out of the game, Los Angeles beats Philadelphia, 2-1, thanks to an unearned run scored in the bottom of the twelfth inning.
- 1998 Tony Womack of the Pirates establishes a new major league mark by not grounding out into a double play in 888 consecutive at-bats, breaking the record previously established by Dodger outfielder Pete Reiser in 1946.
- 2005 Ryan Freel becomes the first player in the Reds’ 136-year history to steal five bases in a game, including two in the ninth that moves him to third base, where he scores the eventual winning run on Felipe Lopez’s sacrifice fly. The Cincinnati second baseman’s thievery contributes to the team’s 7-6 victory over the Dodgers at Chavez Ravine. [Note: the Dodgers’ catcher was Jason Phillips, in his only season with the team.]
Lineups when available.
Teamwork 🥰 = Sweep Alert 🚨#NATITUDE pic.twitter.com/7GMTH5mNk8
— Washington Nationals (@Nationals) July 27, 2022
Today's #Dodgers lineup vs. Nationals: pic.twitter.com/tsICN4gMuT
— Los Angeles Dodgers (@Dodgers) July 27, 2022
NPUT
Gnats fall again to Snakes. Dodgers lead SD by 11.5, SF by 17.5, Snakes by 20.5, Rox by 21.
Okay Price. Let’s get three outs now, please.
Just like that.
Mookie learned the outfield in the minors? He was a 2B guy coming up? Huh. I didn’t know that.
Mookie has always been a learned person.
WBB: Thanks for your post about my new neighbor, Brad Pitt — https://www.sfgate.com/centralcoast/article/brad-pitt-buys-california-clifftop-castle-17329767.php.
My wife and I dropped out of the bidding at $35 million.
Regarding the book by “Danny Santiago,” an Anglo who wrote as if he was a Chicano, one of our reporters at the Monterey Herald broke that story in 1984. It was quite a sensation. More on the author:
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1988-05-21-mn-2879-story.htm
Let me know whether or not you can open it.
Could not open.
I have umpired 81 games this season, most of them behind the plate, from the young leagues through varsity high school. These include summer games. I certainly have missed calls behind the plate. But watching how the MLB umpires miss calls — more than two or three a game — I feel as if I am in good company.
Are you fluent in Braille?
I got in trouble earlier this year when the German Shepherd didn’t show up and I broke my white cane.
We can only presume that you rely on your hearing aid.
That’s quite a skill.
Thanks. I have been doing it for 20 years and I I greatly enjoy it. I’ve made about $6,000 this year. I don’t do it for the money, but I wouldn’t do it if I wasn’t paid.
My goodness. Turn on the game in the second inning and what do I find? A six-run first inning and another disappointing outing for poor Corbin.
GM Mike Rizzo of the Nats (gnot the Gnats) just said he wouldn’t even consider a salary dump in a Soto trade package. I wonder whether he’s reconsidered.
Implies that he doesn’t need the money to spend on other (better) players. Going for a full tank job it would seem.
“Few tank job?”
Refresh is our friend.
When I was growing up in L.A. and listened to virtually every game — very, very few were televised — I thought the best thing would be to turn on the radio and have the No. 3 hitter, almost always Willie Davis, leading off the second inning. That would mean that the Dodgers had scored 5, 6, 7 or 8 runs in the first inning as 11 men would have batted. It won’t be Willie Davis, but the No. 3 batter, Freddie Freeman, will lead off in the second.
I’m old enough to remember seeing Willie D play in the PCL.
Over lunch here, before the game started, I was texting with my son. He said the Dodgers better win today – or he would become a Giants fan. (He was totally joking of course.) But I texted back that the Dodgers would win big today: 18-2. We will see how close I was.
You’re on pace to lose that bet.
Yeah – it should have been my third inning score
Maybe 4th or 5th
Scoop, you have a new neighbor. https://www.sfgate.com/centralcoast/article/brad-pitt-buys-california-clifftop-castle-17329767.php
Like the Ancient Mariner, the Dodgers stoppeth (winneth?) one in three.
That’s a classic comment.
It would seem more appropriate in Seattle.
I can’t claim credit. I think Roger Angell quoted the poem in one of his wonderful baseball columns, but I couldn’t tell you which one.
Was Coleridge a baseball fan? Rounders, maybe?
Could be.
Dodgers win!
Woo-HOO!!!
Here in Oaktown, the last-place Atléticos have just swept the Trashtros.
Going along with your theory on first and last place teams.
Continuing to go far afield, here is the Wikipedia entry, WBB (and others), on Daniel Lewis James. It’s quite interesting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Lewis_James
Thanks Scoop. I had just read the Pitt article and was then wondering about DL James.
Lux!
Will’s bat has cooled off.
I grew up learning about Campy catching for the Brooklyn Dodgers and how he would alternate years between hitting at MVP levels with struggles. Since then I have it ingrained in me that catchers only hit well in alternating years. (Obviously not always true however.)
Nice sliding catch by Zach Mac
Lost my Spectrum game!
It’s on MLB.TV for free; you can watch it on your computer or, I expect, Smartphone.
Blacked out. But just came back on at Spectrum.
That’s interesting. Same thing happened to me out here in the ocean. I even called the Spectrum trouble line. Rebooted the cable box and when it came back the signal was back too.
Next time anyone complains about Kimbrel, remember that closer Taylor Rogers of the Paddies has a 1-5 W-L record and 7 blown saves.
Mookie can throw out runners wherever he plays.
Reed replicating Cleavinger?
Not quite, and more cushion to work with. But for Lux’s error, Cleavinger’s outing would’ve been fine.
His first inning would have been fine, but not his second inning: 4 earned runs in two-third of an inning.
It’s hard to counter counter-factuals.
And kitchen counters. They are hard as well.
Granted.
https://twitter.com/Dodgers/status/1552331616101355522
Pitching on track today thus far.
Who was sent down when Heaney was activated, Cleavinger or Moronta?
Moronta I’m pretty sure.
Hey, welcome to the party, RBI. The band’s first song was its best.
Hoping for a re-mix on the flip side of the record.
Cleavinger and White both optioned, Jake Reed also called up.
Oh oops.
Cleavinger replaced Reyes to begin with, no?
In the Motor City, the Paddles just blew one to the Tigres in the ninth.
Nelson Cruz, now 42, broke into the majors in 2005. This surprised me: He has 457 home runs.
He’s never been anything more than a DH.
Not quite. I went to baseball-reference.com. Through yesterday, Cruz had played 970 games in the outfield and the same number, 970, as DH. Most of his outfield work was nearer to the start of his career.
He was always at least a de facto DH.
What is a de facto DH?
Through his first nine seasons, some of them partial, he was a DH only in 31 games.
His calling card: Give me 600 PA and I’ll give you 40 dingers.
Quite a first.
Heaney will be rusty by the time he comes back out.
Hanser is the Answer!
Everyone is the answer right now.
Corbin has the most losses (13) and the highest ERA (6.02) of any qualified pitcher in MLB this year.
Will he win this year’s Chuck Stobbs Award?
Dodgers made him work… and JT makes it pay off.
Could be the smallest Dodger Stadium crowd of the year.
Mid-week day games are very unusual.
Yes, and they seem to become more unusual every year.
Only on getaway days, it appears.
If I could be there, I would. Looks like a beautiful sunny day at the ballpark!
Totally agree. We have to get you down to Dodger Stadium sometime.
No Bellinger or Muncy against a lefty.
Today’s Dodgers-Nationals game is the free game of the day on MLB.TV.