Game 129, 2017

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Brewers at Dodgers, 1:10 PM PT, TV: SPNLA, FSWI, MLBN (out-of-market only)

The Brewers send RHP Jimmy (Big Sweat) Nelson (9-6, 3.79 ERA) out to face the Dodgers’ RHP Yu (Yu-san) Darvish (8-9, 3.83 ERA) in the rubber match of the three-game series.

The Dodgers faced Nelson on June 2 at Miller Park, when he threw eight shutout innings and struck out 11 but got no decision in a game the Dodgers won, 2-1, in 12 innings. Darvish is 2-0 with a 2.50 ERA over 18 innings in the three starts he’s made as a Dodger. He’s never faced the Brewers.

The Dodgers reinstate Darvish and add Fields to the 10-day DL retroactively with lower back strain.

Today in Dodgers’ history:

  • 1992 Kevin Gross, retiring 22 of the final 23 batters he faces on his wife’s birthday, no-hits the Giants at Dodger Stadium, 2-0. The LA right-hander’s no-no averts the team from being swept in a four-game series at home against the Giants for the first time in 69 years.
  • 2013 Clayton Kershaw blanks the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park, 5-0, giving the Dodgers their first double-digit winning streak since 2006. The team’s 42 victories in their last fifty games, including a 25-3 mark since the All-Star break, equals the 1941 Yankees and 1942 Cardinals for the best record for that span of games since 1900.

John Henry of the Red Sox has recently advocated the renaming of Yawkey Way outside Fenway Park in Boston. Here’s one of the reasons why: in 1946 a committee formed to study integration, which includes Red Sox owner Tom Yawkey, delivers its secretive report during an Owners’ Meeting. It defends the covert color barrier which exists in professional baseball. The absurd reasons given to why blacks shouldn’t be allowed to play in the big leagues include an absence of skills due to inferior training and lack of fundamentals and the need to respect Negro League contracts, but another lesser known motivation may have been profit as revealed later in the report, “The Negro leagues rent their parks in many cities from clubs in Organized Baseball (and) Club owners in the major leagues are reluctant to give up revenues amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars every year” as well as the fear white fans would be driven away if black players attracted more minorities to the ballpark.

Lineup when available.

179 thoughts on “Game 129, 2017”

  4. Last 30 games:

    Barnes .316 .422 .395 .817
    Grandal .191 .276 .426 .703

    Bellinger .328 .411 .656 1.067
    A-gon .184 .220 .316 .535

    Grandy .138 .342 .448 .790

    The last 30 games are different for every player in that Bellinger hasn’t played in the last 8 of thoses games and A-gon and Grandy didn’t play in the first 20 but this is what has been going on for those last 30 in one way or another.

    I left out players that were plugging along.

    If Joc can figure it out in the next week he has a spot. Grandy and A-gon have not yet closed the door.

    Here is the lineup I would hope can lead the way into and through the playoffs and WS.

    LF Taylor
    SS Seager
    3B Turner
    1B Bellinger
    C Barnes
    CF Pederson (fingers crossed)
    RF Puig
    2B Forsythe

  5. How about we say this weekend was so bad because of the uniforms . . . and Tuesday starts anew? I don’t think there are any other total solar eclipses scheduled, so that’s out of the way as well.

  6. Some good news for me today: Kersh is schedule to pitch Friday in San Diego and I’ll be at the game!

    • Not that they’re endangered at the moment, but two leads which ARE important: vs. Nats and Astros.

      • Nats lost their first game today, leading in the second. ‘Stros won, but I doubt they’re gonna make it to the Series.

  10. .181 BA this series.
    AZ is another team fighting for the playoffs, so we’ll see what happens then, with at least Tuesday without Cody.

  11. If they had to lose another series this year, better now than postseason.
    Hopefully they get untracked and are more competitive at the plate throughout the whole game starting Tuesday.

  16. I was just about to say I’m not impressed with Forsythe in this situation, but radio says he has 2 of the 10 Dodger walk-off hits this year.
    I’m just hoping for a hit to tie.

  20. Radio says the reliever gives up lots of SB. This LA management team seems to be quite aware of stats.

  28. In Phoenix today, the late Gnatt Cain allowed eight earned in two-thirds of an inning in relief, as the Snakes poisoned the Gnats 11-0.

  29. Bellinger may not have needed the DL. I think it was a luxury the Dodgers felt they could afford.

    • They CAN afford it — I like the philosophy of getting a healthy team ready. While it’s frustrating to see the change of fortune, it’s important to learn now what happens when he’s not there and perhaps Doc can “cure” it.

  30. I went last night with my daughter and sister. Delightful weather. Had fun. But as for the game?

    • Wow — definitely the team’s MVP.
      But if they fall apart when he’s not there (and one game under .500 for this team IS falling apart), I hope this isn’t a repeat of the year Hanley was hit in the playoffs.

      • Do you the Cards pitcher — I can’t remember his name — hit him intentionally?

        • I’m not saying it, but I believe we speculated about it back then. It definitely deflated the Dodgers’ O. If I remember right, Zack and Kersh gave up a total of 1 run in two games and they lost both.

  40. RBI is allowed to only sit in her seat when the Dodgers are in the field — at least in this game. Or until Nelson is out.

  42. The joys of gameday – seeing in play runs even as the announcers are calling a routine fly ball.

  52. Nelson pitching very well again today. Perhaps it is his pitching and not Dodger hitting that’s at issue.

      • So much for taking the pressure off Kersh.
        Thankfully there’s still hope from Wood, Hill, Ryu, and Maeda.

  57. Not much to say really. Dodgers just need to work out of this micro-slump. Can’t send everyone down to OKC and send everyone there up.

    • Hey, if Frank Lane can trade Cleveland manager Joe Gordon to the Tigers for manager Jimmy Dykes in mid-season (1960), why not send your whole roster to AAA for a day or two?

  63. Radio agreeing bats are asleep . . . Mo delicately saying for the last week and a half, they haven’t been that “potent.”

    How long has Belli been out? I hope the team isn’t like a couple of years ago when the bats collapsed when Hanley was hurt.

    • Bound to be some regression, but really at the mole hill stage at this point. The last shutout during this period before yesterday was when the team hit hard and often and they just didn’t fall in during the not-so perfect game. Then there was the Verlander game. So really only 2 of the past ten games.

      • Verlander was last Sunday. So in the seven until today, they went 4-3, with two shutouts and one game scoring only once. (Today’s not over, but it’s falling into that pessimistic trend.)

        Yes, it’s cyclical. So is the postseason.

        • Post season a little short to be cyclical. In any event, 4-3 gets you a crown. My point was that you need to go beyond the line score to assess the “potency” of the bats over the past week. I understand the no-Belli narrative and we are better with him, just don’t think you need to overstate the case.

  64. It’s incredible to hear that the Brewers have had over 40 blown leads . . . and the Dodgers don’t even have 40 losses!

  66. Back in the games from June until this week, down 3 in the 3rd wouldn’t be a problem.

    • Was it an official game? Did the result count in the standings? If so I think it should count as a no-hitter. it’s not the pitcher’s fault it didn’t go nine innings. If, like Haddix’s game, it went on into extra innings and was broken up then, so be it — it’s not a “no-hitter through nine innings” or some such asterisked category, but if it ended with one pitcher holding the other team hitless I think he ought to get credit for it.

      • I’m with you. It was as complete a game as it could be, and should count as such.

      • I’m fine with a five-inning complete game no-hitter, but I’d still note its length in the record book.

      • Neither would be a pitcher’s “fault” if he was yanked by the manager after five with a no-no, and then the pen gave up hits subsequently.

      • In your desire to be fair, would you fellows draw the line at crediting the pitcher with a shutout as well?

        • I would define a perfect game as one in which the pitcher did not allow a base runner through 9. Kershaw would get credit for a perfect game when Hanley made the error to allow the only base runner. I would definitely make it a perfect game if the only runner was on base as a result of an error and was erased with a double play or picked off.

          I would give a no hitter/perfect game to anybody that got 27 outs without a hit or base runner.