Since the beginning of the unofficial second half of the season, the Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Francisco Giants have gone in opposite directions.
Los Angeles, without ace Clayton Kershaw due to injury, won series against the first-place Washington Nationals, and St. Louis Cardinals, who are within striking distance in the National League Wild Card race.
The one blemish for the Dodgers was the series loss against the sub-.500 Arizona Diamondbacks. Conversely, the Giants have gone 1-8 since the All-Star break and their lead in the National League West is down to 2.5 games entering play on Tuesday.
The Dodgers’ turnaround has been led in part by Adrian Gonzalez, Howie Kendrick and Justin Turner rounding into form at the plate.
Despite being in the middle of a division race, Turner made it clear the focus can’t yet be placed on chasing the Giants, per Doug Padilla of ESPN:
“We just have to keep playing good baseball,” Turner said. “Everyone looks up and watches the scoreboard, but you can’t worry what the Giants are going. We just have to play good baseball. We get to play them a few times down the stretch, so if we keep playing good ball we’ll be right where we need to be the next time we see them.”
Gonzalez echoed a similar sentiment:
“For the most part, we haven’t even talked about the division, where we’re at,” Gonzalez said. “It’s not really something we’re focused on. We’re focused on playing our game, beating the teams we have to beat. Then we can look at it in September and see where we’re at.”
During the All-Star break Giants first baseman Brandon Belt pointed to the Dodgers as a dangerous team that he wasn’t ready to count of the division race despite his club’s comfortable lead at the time. Corey Seager also said he expects the two teams to be neck-and-neck down the stretch.
There are nine head-to-head meetings remaining on the schedule between the longtime rivals. San Francisco has won four of the seven matchups thus far in 2016.
