Steve Webb
LOS ANGELES, CA — Remember in last year’s playoff series against the Giants, Gavin Lux absolutely pulverized a pitch that would have given the Dodgers a tie in the bottom of the 9th of Game 3? Instead, the wind knocked the ball down, and it died in the glove of center fielder Steven Duggar a few feet from the wall. Luxy had already started to celebrate the feat, only to be left stunned a few feet from home plate, utterly slack-jawed in disbelief.
That’s kind of how I felt when I saw the news that the Padres’ Jake Cronenworth, and NOT Gavin Lux would be replacing Jazz Chisolm on the All-Star team. “Say what now?”
There is almost no statistically category in which Cronenworth is ahead of Lux. Batting average? Lux, .296 to .241. On base percentage? Lux, .371 to .337. OPS? Lux again, .791 to .731. Stolen bases? Yep, it’s Lux, 5-1. OPS+? Once again, Gavin is your winner, 121 to 113. The only thing Cronenworth has on my boy Gavin is that he has more homers (9 to 4) and more RBI (49 to 22), but that latter stat is merely a function of his higher position in the Padres batting order, whereas Lux is often hitting in the 9-hole, behind the struggling Max Muncy and Cody Bellinger, and as such doesn’t have a lot of chances to drive in runs.
The only possible way I can see this happening is that the league decided that there were “already too many Dodgers” and adding Lux would just be a step too far. But as the pretty girls used to say when I asked them for a dance, “Make it make sense.” This doesn’t.
It’s a travesty! It’s a sham! It’s an outrage! It’s outrage of a travesty of a sham!
I would like to speak to the manager!
