After sweeping the Los Angeles Angels in the Freeway Series to begin their nine-game road trip, the Los Angeles Dodgers were tasked with facing the San Diego Padres and Milwaukee Brewers for the first time this season.
The Padres have been playing some of their best baseball as of late and always seem to rise up when they face the Dodgers. However, it was L.A. that took two out of three games at Petco Park to maintain their first-place lead in the National League West.
It didn’t get any easier from there as the Dodgers traveled to American Family Field for three games against a Brewers team that recently leapfrogged the Chicago Cubs for first place in the NL Central.
Most teams may dread that type of tough stretch in their schedules, but manager Dave Roberts believes the Dodgers benefit when they face top teams.
“I do,” Roberts said on SportsNet LA when asked if playing top teams brings the best out of the Dodgers. “I don’t know if that’s good or bad. You’d like to think you just kind of have the same intensity and focus every series, certainly probably unfair to expect that.
“But I do think when we play really good teams, your margin is smaller and you’ve got to play good baseball. No one likes to get embarrassed, so yeah, we get up for those series. But you’ve also got to make sure in the following series you don’t let down, because all these games count the same.
“So now looking at the Padres, this is a really good team, so it’s certainly not a letdown series. It’s a team that’s leading their division and they play good baseball, so we’ve got to be ready to play good.”
The Dodgers began their three-game series against the Brewers with a 5-1 loss on Friday that snapped a modest two-game winning streak.
Like they did against the Padres, L.A. responded with consecutive wins to take the series. That resulted in an overall 7-2 record on their road trip.
Upcoming Dodgers schedule
Now having gotten through the difficult stretch, the Dodgers get somewhat of a break when they return home to host the last-place Colorado Rockies for three games. However, they will then face another challenge by playing the Philadelphia Phillies and Arizona Diamondbacks in back-to-back series.
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