Los Angeles Dodgers: Wrapping up a sweep against a familiar southpaw

The Los Angeles Dodgers are on the brink of sweeping the San Diego Padres and face a familiar southpaw that the offense must hit early.

It is crazy how baseball works. Three days ago, the Los Angeles Dodgers were four and a half games out of first place in the NL West, coming off the heels of being swept by the St. Louis Cardinals.

Three days later, and two big wins later, and the Dodgers find themselves just 2.5 games back of the division lead as the Arizona Diamondbacks have dropped two straight games to the Seattle Mariners.

While this is promising in making the playoffs, it is too early to declare the Dodgers are back and get excited about a deep playoff run. The fact of the matter still exists that the Dodgers have struggled against other playoff-caliber teams and have struggled more in big spots in those games.

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Winning games against the San Diego Padres is great. However, beating the team with the worst record in the National League does not instantly flip a team’s status when it comes to World Series contention.

Thus, the Dodgers need to capitalize on this series as it truly is a break from a tough month of August. A sweep here is especially huge as the Dodgers will head to Texas to play the Rangers twice before hosting the Arizona Diamondbacks.

By that time, the Dodgers could either be six games back or one game ahead. That window is particularly large, depending on the results of all the teams. Regardless, the series against Arizona could completely swing the playoff picture in the NL West.

The Dodgers need to gain as many games as possible before that series, so capitalizing early off of a familiar southpaw in Robbie Erlin is huge.

Yesterday, Sarah was successful in her Los Angeles Dodgers Beat the Streak pick, Clayton Kershaw (that is the second time she has been right on Kershaw!) Me, being irresponsible, completely forgot to even post the article or make a selection of my own, so my streak remained in place.

Sarah’s pick — Current streak 2: Brian Dozier

My pick for today is Brian Dozier. Dozier has been pretty consistent in a Dodgers uniform and has been helping that offense exactly how the front office hoped he would. Today as the Dodgers try and sweep the Padres, they’ll need all the offense they had the past few days, and Dozier could be the one to get it started.

Jason’s pick — Current streak 5: Justin Turner

Justin Turner has been the Dodgers best hitter over the last two weeks and has been one of few hitters to actually come up in big spots. Last night, that big spot was a walk-off flare shot down the right field line that plated Matt Kemp from second base.

It was not pretty but it got the job done and gave the Dodgers a huge win against the Padres. A loss there would have sucked the life and potential momentum out of the team, especially considering Kenley Jansen had another blown save.

Tonight, Turner and the Dodgers face Erlin, who has allowed a .371 batting average against the Dodgers. Turner has contributed to that success as he is 2-3 with a solo shot against Erlin.

Expect the Dodgers to jump on Erlin early, like the team has the last two games, scoring in the first inning in both games. However, this time, the Dodgers are going to follow the trend from the first game and score in bunches and come out with a 5-7 run victory.