Steve Webb
LOS ANGELES, CA — As we wait it out for the All-Star Game and the second half of the 2022 season to begin, we continue our tour around the diamond with a look at the outfield. What they’ve done, where they’re at physically, and what we’re hoping for down the stretch run.
Chris Taylor (LF) .238 BA, 6 HR, 27 RBI
CT3 hasn’t played since the 4th of July, as he is on the IL nursing a foot injury. Jake Lamb, Gavin Lux, and Trayce Thompson have all seen time in his stead, but the team really needs a productive Taylor to be on the field to be at optimum capacity. Before he went on the IL, Taylor was mired in a pretty bad slump, that has seen his batting average plummet from .296 on May 7th to where it is today. In addition, 42 strikeout in his last 100 at-bat is less than ideal. There is still too much swing-and-miss in Taylor’s game at the plate for my taste. Hopefully this time on the shelf will give him a chance for a little reset, and he can come back to being the vital part of the lineup that he’s been in seasons past.
Cody Bellinger (CF) .210 BA, 11 HR, 31 RBI
It’s hard to know what to do with Cody Bellinger. He’s obviously uber-talented. You don’t get an MVP award on a fluke. His defense in center, and speed on the basepaths make him an asset, to be sure. However, we all just want Cody to “snap out of it.” For a hot minute, it looked like he would. He had a good string of games and was named NL Player of the Week in late April, but alas. It was just an illusion. He quickly reverted back to the struggling Cody of last year. The good news: his power stroke is still there, and his OPS is over 100 points higher than it was in 2021. The bad news: he’s still a couple hundred points lower than his career averages, and considerably below league average. With an OPS+ of 78 (100 is league average), can the Dodgers ride this out in hopes that he somehow finds what has been lost? Time will tell, but as of now, Bellinger is a prime non-tender candidate at the end of the season.
Mookie Betts (RF): .265 BA, 20 HR, 47 RBI
I guess we’re just going to have to get used to the streaky nature of the player named Mookie Betts. He’ll get into patches where he’s striking out a lot (watching strike three go by far too often), and then suddenly he’ll come to the ballpark and he’ll be amazing for three weeks straight. Follow the bouncing ball: .780 OPS in April, 1.157 in May, back to .523 in June, and .772 so far in July. Of course, it didn’t help that Betts was sidelined after the collision with Cody Bellinger in the middle of June. Here’s another case where we like what we see, we just like to see a more consistent result. Still, in the playoffs when the chips are down, Betts can help a team win in so many ways. It’s going to be interesting to see where the ball bounces next.
Others…
When AJ Pollock got traded away to the ChiSox, we all knew that it was going to make the outfield ranks pretty thin. Gavin Lux has been serviceable in left, but I like him much more in the infield. And we don’t have to remind everyone of the Eddie Alvarez fiasco right after Betts got injured. For a brief moment, Kevin Pillar looked like he’d be able to fill that void, but he went down to injury as well. This is why the Jake Lamb call-up and the Trayce Thompson acquisition are so important. Thompson is especially good in the field, and the pop that both of them have in their bets make them a good pinch-hitting option off the bench late in games.
DODGERSBEAT RATING, OUTFIELD: A for defense, B for offense; let’s call it a B+
