Los Angeles Dodgers: The month of May, by the numbers

The Los Angeles Dodgers were phenomenal in the month of May and it is not just the numbers of wins that we can take away from the month.

The Los Angeles Dodgers continue to be on a roll as spring begins to turn to summer. As of this writing, the Dodgers have a nine-game lead in the National League West and have the most wins in baseball.

When May started, the Dodgers had just a one-game lead in the standings, having become the first team to get to 20 wins in the majors. In just 31 days, they outplayed their NL West rivals by a good eight games and along the way they became the first team in the majors to win 30 and 40 games.

It’s impossible to tell the future but it would take a terrible slump or perhaps a major injury to erode what they’ve built. But for now, the Dodgers don’t look like they plan on slowing down they have the look of a team who are ready to steamroll the season.

Let’s look at what made May so special for the Los Angeles Dodgers

19-7

The Dodgers went 19-7 during the month of May that’s a .731 winning percentage. Through the whole month, they never lost two games in a row and they finished strong, winning nine out of eleven games.

They started the month with three straight one-run games and then from there they didn’t have another close call until May 29th.

Of the Dodgers 19 wins, 13 came by outscoring their opponents by three or more runs. When the Dodgers weren’t bludgeoning the opposition, it was their starting pitching picking up the slack. Dodgers pitching had six shutouts over the course of the month and in eight other wins gave up three runs or less.

1.48

Hyun Jin-Ryu has put up an argument to be baseball’s best pitcher and is currently in the driver’s seat to be the National League Cy Young Award winner through May.

His 1.48 ERA leads the majors and in the NL, his closest competitor is the Milwaukee Brewers’ Zach Davies at 2.20 — that’s close to a full run better for Ryu.

Over the month of May, Ryu went 5-0 with a minuscule 0.59 ERA, striking out 36 while walking just three batters. .

.272

In the space of a month, Joc Pederson has turned himself into the Los Angeles Dodgers’ second most dangerous hitter in the lineup. At the end of April, Pederson was hitting .233, which is close to his career average of .232. But now, Pederson is hitting .272 and he did that by going on a tear in May.

Pederson had a slash line of .323/.405/.723/1.128 while slugging eight home runs and driving in 13 runs. His home runs and RBI’s were down but consider that Pederson did all this in 65 at-bats as opposed to 95 at-bats in March/April. That means Pederson was more efficient over the fewer at-bats he had.

Rightfully the talk this year has been all about Cody Bellinger, but Pederson deserves credit for turning himself into a dangerous hitter as well.