Steve Webb
CINCINNATI — Okay, this is just getting ridiculous. For the second straight night, the Dodgers offense showed up big time, only to be let down by poor pitching and an inability to tack on after getting out to an early lead. It was, um, not great.
This time, Noah Syndergaard got shelled, giving up six runs over just three innings of work. The Thor 2.0 Experience has reached its nadir. It ain’t happening; cut the dude.
Even so, the Dodgers could have won this game. They got all sorts of offense in the first three innings, getting homers from Mookie Betts, Miguel Vargas, and Will Smith to jump out to a 6-2 lead after two and a half innings. Unfortunately for the Dodgers, the other guys get to bat, too, and that lead lasted barely fifteen minutes, as the Reds came storming back against Syndergaard in the bottom of the third, thanks in part to a mammoth homer from rookie phenom Elly De la Cruz.
From there, the game settled into an unexpected pitcher’s duel, as neither team could get anything going in innings 4-8. Then, with the score still knotted at six apiece, the game went into the fateful 9th inning. Alexis Diaz sent the Dodgers down in order in their half of the inning, and Dave Roberts called on Evan Phillips to get the game into extras for the Boys in Blue.
That, um, didn’t happen. Phillips was missing badly with some of his pitches, and was missing his spots even when he threw strikes. Leadoff man T.J. Hopkins got on with an infield single, which brought to the plate struggling rookie Will Benson, who entered the game with no homers, no RBI, and a sub-.200 batting average. But if you center-cut a fastball like Phillips did to Benson, he’s gonna hurt you. The rookie blasted a two-run shot to right, and just like that, the game was over. It was the Dodgers’ fourth straight loss, and second straight walk-off loss to the Reds, a time that they’ve completely owned for years. The whole mess left manager Dave Roberts searching for answers.
“He’s been going through it all year,” Roberts said of his troubled starter Syndergaard. “It’s not from a lack of effort, preparation or care. But it’s just not working. I know there’s things with that blister that he’s had to deal with and he certainly doesn’t want to make excuses for. I know there was a fingernail break tonight that he’s not going to make excuses for. And he understands it’s about performance.
“We’re going to be sitting down with him and try to figure out if this is something that — obviously, I don’t think that we can kind of sustain at this pace of performance, so I don’t know, it might be an opportunity to give him a chance to get this finger thing taken care of, a reset. Because it’s certainly, in my opinion, impeding performance.”
Clayton Kershaw, your work is cut out for you. Get this team back on track. Stat.
