The Los Angeles Dodgers’ struggles to begin the season have been well-documented, and that continued on Thursday night with a loss to the Cincinnati Reds, who entered play with the worst record in the National League.
Perhaps the biggest issue for the Dodgers is their inability to hit with runners in scoring position. They’ve regularly left the bases loaded and went 1-for-7 with me in scoring position in the 4-1 loss to the Reds.
Cody Bellinger is one of the players that is struggling at the plate right now, as he’s a combined 0-for-8 with five strikeouts in the last two games. Bellinger has swung through a number of fastballs in the center of the plate, pitches that he often hit into the bleachers in 2017.
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts addressed Bellinger’s struggles and explained he doesn’t feel the need to move the All-Star first baseman to the bench because of his defensive value, via SportsNet LA:
“Cody, he’s struggling. There’s balls that he’s trying to bear down, there’s balls in the strike zone that he’s swinging through. He’s going out of the zone and you can see that he’s pressing. The game is starting to speed up on him. But the thing is with Cody, what he brings defensively is a big plus. He saved us a couple big runs early today. It’s not about just being in the batter’s box. So with him, there are times where you give a guy a day off, for sure, but right now I think that for me, Cody needs to play and continue to go out there and compete.”
Bellinger is still batting .271/.329/.443 on the season, so it hasn’t been all negative. He only has four home runs in 37 games though, which is well off the 39-homer pace that he produced en route to becoming the unanimous National League Rookie of the Year.
While it is easy to nit-pick with Bellinger because of how much talent he has displayed since being called up, he is not the only one that is struggling at the plate with runners in scoring position.
The Dodgers had Reds starter Tyler Mahle on the ropes early but wound up stranding eight runners through the first three innings. Reds pitchers then faced the minimum over the final six innings, further emphasizing how much the Dodgers offense is pressing as a whole.
