Back from the Brink
Dodgers 3 — Rangers 1

Mission accomplished, I suppose.
With such a big series looming it would be easy to forgive the Dodgers for overlooking these two games against the Rangers, but that didn’t seem to be the case. Everything lined up during this trip and now they head back to Los Angeles fully in the thick of both the division and Wild Card race. I’m genuinely impressed.
More and more, the series against St. Louis feels a bit like we had a near death experience. I promise I’ll stop bringing it up after this, but I’m just having a hard time getting past how much things could’ve gone awry after losing those games. In the course of getting swept, pretty much everything that could’ve gone wrong went extremely wrong. All of a sudden, the team found itself peering out over the edge of the abyss. It would’ve been so easy, right then and there, to casually drift out into it. Seasons are long and the Playoffs are hard. They could’ve just let go.
Instead, they swept the Padres and they’ve now swept the Rangers as well. These teams were not difficult matchups from a talent perspective, but the Dodgers weren’t just playing the Padres and the Rangers. They were playing against the path of least resistance. They were fighting against natural selection, a concept that was bearing down quickly, daring them to surrender and admit that they weren’t quite good enough to compete.
That particular fight isn’t anywhere near to being finished, but it’s great to see that we’re still in it.
Let’s quickly run through the facts of this game because, frankly, they weren’t all that exciting. The bats were sort of quiet tonight, only four hits total, but I’m choosing to believe that they’re biding their time, lying in wait, ready to pounce when we truly need them. Never again will we waste 11 runs on a game that doesn’t matter. Nay, the runs are a precious resource that we must be cautious with. This theory is brought to you by lots of fact-based science and research that I’m not at liberty to share, but can assure you totallys exists.
We did hit a bunch of dingers though. Three solo shots from Belli, Manny, and Yaz. Like most home runs that the Dodgers hit, they were very good.
Alex Wood had an impressive outing. It started out a little shaky in the first two frames, he allowed entirely too many base runners for my liking, but he didn’t let anyone score and finished the night with seven shutout innings. The argument could be made that against a team like the Rangers this is exactly what he should be doing, but we’re not going to make it. Wood isn’t the best starter we have on the staff but he’s been a remarkably steady option at the end of the rotation and I’m going to choose to be thankful for that.
Kenta Maeda got the 9th inning and sort of fumbled around a bit, walking two and letting a run score, but finishing the job in the end. This is sort of bleak, but there’s a version of this season where Kenley doesn’t quite right the ship down the stretch and we end up having to rely on Kenta in this role. That’s not something I want, but it is encouraging to see the players and the staff doing the necessary preparations just in case.
I want to take a quick moment to talk about a quick moment in the 7th. Yasiel Puig, having just belted a triple out to right center and sliding face first into third, attempted to steal home two pitches later. It was audacious. It was exciting. It….did not work.
It was still very cool though. There were two outs and Belli had two strikes on him so, like, if ever you were going to attempt something a little dumb, this was the time to do it, right? I’m mostly just very much preparing myself for the moment down the stretch when Puig is on third and we all collectively realize he’s making a break for it and our hearts just jump out of our chests and sprint away. This is not going to be a healthy month of casual sports watching.
Stay safe out there everyone.
So, now it’s here. The series that might decide everything. Or nothing. It all sort of depends.
I think I’m mostly anxious to see the Dodgers playing against the Diamondbacks in the flesh as opposed to ambiguously on a scoreboard. We’ve been in a pretty consistent fight with them for so long and yet, we haven’t played them since May. That’s just how baseball works, but it doesn’t make it less weird. The results of these games will have a similar effect on the standings, but they’ll intrinsically mean so much more. If we aren’t better than them in person, what makes us think we’re better than them at all?
In theory this should be fun. A proper test. But, I dunno, right now I’m sort of savoring the last few hours I have with Shcrödinger’s Dodgers. Right now, the Dodgers might be better than the D-Backs and they might not. Come Sunday night, we’ll know for sure. I think I might prefer the relative sanctuary of the great unknown.
However, the Dodgers are as ready as they’ll ever be for this test. The bats have been better, the rotation’s been consistent, and the bullpen continues to show signs of life. They’ve proven over the last week that, even when bad things happen, they’re prepared to buckle up and fight for their playoff lives. The fight is now officially on our doorsteps.
Time to get some answers.
