Saturday, May 9, 2009

Pre-Manny Dodgers make their return to the plate

Yes, the Dodgers definitely missed Manny Ramirez last night.

I'll be the first to admit to all of the critics that his lack of presence was indeed felt as the Dodgers looked helpless in trying to score runners on base. The Giants used strong pitching and just enough hitting to get the win, 3-1. That's now 2 losses without Manny, and 48 games to go.

Chad Billingsley was the starter, and while his final line wasn't bad, he battled some control problems as the night wore on. He went 7 IP, 8 H, 3 ER, 4 BB, 5 K. Granted, none of the 8 hits he allowed went for extra-bases, so he caught a break there. He just wasn't as dominating as he's been this season.

The game was scoreless after 5 innings of play. Barry Zito, like Billingsley, let runners reach base, but stranded them. I'll give credit where credit is due - after ragging on him endlessly for quite awhile, he has pitched very well lately to earn a respectable 3.57 ERA. Has he finally figured things out? For the Giants to win, and considering the high price tag it cost to get him there, they better hope so.

The scoring started in the 6th as Edgar Renteria and Randy Winn singled to open it up. Pablo Sandoval flew out deep to Matt Kemp, but Renteria advanced to 3rd. Andre Ethier had to make a running catch into foul territory off the bat of Aaron Roward, but Renteria tagged up and scored to go up 1-0.

The Dodgers got it back in the bottom of the 6th, as they too used singles to lead off by Matt Kemp and Russell Martin. But, Martin showed some horrible baserunning by easily getting gunned out trying to advance to 2nd while Kemp went to 3rd. After Mark Loretta struck out, Casey Blake just got one out of the reach of a diving Fred Lewis in left to even it up.

Billingsley went back to work in the 7th, but got knocked around. The bases were loaded with 1 down on singles by Juan Uribe and Emanuel Burriss, and an intentional pass to Fred Lewis. Renteria hit a sac-fly RBI to make it 2-1. Randy Winn walked to load 'em up, and Joe Torre elected to keep Bills in the game. Too bad a dinky infield single by Sandoval to score another made that decision look bad.

It wasn't a pretty sight in the last few innings as the Dodgers put men on base, but either K'd or grounded into double plays. The 9th ended when Rafael Furcal grounded into his 2nd DP of the game, putting an end to a miserable night at the plate for the men in blue.

Overall, the Dodgers could only muster 1 run despite getting 9 hits and gathering 5 walks. They also left 9 men on base, including 5 in scoring position with 2 outs. Their only stolen base attempt was gunned down, and they hit into 3 doubles plays. Those are just some ugly numbers.

As the game wore on, and certainly afterwards, I couldn't help but think that these were the Dodgers we had to endure on a nightly basis before Manny arrived last year. You get the feeling that every run they get, they will have to scratch and claw for. Nothing looked easy.

I know the critics who say the Dodgers will tank without Manny will point directly to this game, and they have some good evidence to back up their claims. It's still too early to say how they'll do, because we should keep in mind that they scored 9 runs 2 nights ago without him. But what they really need is guys like Ethier and Kemp to start hitting for power. If they don't, then a lot will have to go their way if they want to consistently put runs up and win.

It's a FOX game this afternoon, as Eric Stults takes the mound. He put in a good outing against the Diamondbacks last start, and with the team looking for their first post-Manny win, he needs another solid one today.

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