LA Dodgers: Final stretch of the regular season is an easy one
With the best record in baseball, the LA Dodgers have an easy road left to finish the season off.
The LA Dodgers have the best record in baseball at 28-10, are riding a 4-game winning streak, and are 8-2 in their last 10 games. They will likely run away with their eighth consecutive NL West title. That feat doesn’t mean too much, but this team is running wild with World Series potential.
The Dodgers have a five-game lead on the San Diego Padres, nine-game lead on the San Francisco Giants, nine-and-a-half over the Colorado Rockies, and 12-and-a-half over the Arizona Diamondbacks. They are 4-3 against the Padres, 6-4 against the Giants, 3-0 against the Rockies, and 3-1 against the D’Backs.
Out of the 12 series they’ve played, four were sweeps. Looking at their upcoming games, they finish this series against Arizona and have three more series against division opponents. They face the Houston Astros in Los Angeles twice, and face the Oakland Athletics and Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in back to back three-game series at home to finish the season.
Even if the Dodgers go 16-8 in the remaining games, which isn’t likely unless something drastic goes wrong, they’ll still be a top team in the league with a 43-18 record. Some predict the Dodgers could finish 45-15, but with the Padres heating up, the remaining three-game series against them can go south very quickly.
The Dodgers’ players statistics don’t do the numbers justice. Only one Dodger is in the top-20 in batting average, and it’s Corey Seager at No. 18 with a .311 batting average.
Mookie Betts, Cody Bellinger, Seager, and Max Muncy are all in the top-20 in the home runs, but they are all in ties. Betts has 11 homeruns on the season and is in a four-way tie for No. 7, Bellinger has 10 and is in an eight-way tie for No. 11, and Seager and Muncy have nine homeruns and they are in a nine-way tie for No. 19.
The Dodgers lead the league in homeruns with 68 as a team and are ranked second in runs batted in with 199. The team is No. 14 in batting average, No. 8 in hits, and tied for eighth in stolen bases.
The Dodgers’ pitching has been solid in some respects, leading the league in earned run average as a team with a combined 2.77 and in wins with 27. Dodgers are tied for sixth in saves with 11, are ranked 10th in strikeouts with 312, and are in the top-three in shutouts. They’ve allowed 42 homeruns as a team, which is in the top-10 lowest in the league, and are ranked in the bottom five for walks. But they’ve been bad in others, ranked second in opponent batting average and in walks plus hits per inning pitched.
In the remaining games for the regular season, they have five more games against the 14-22 D’Backs, seven games against the 17-19 Rockies, two games against the 19-15 Astros, three games against the 22-15 Padres, three games against the 22-12 Athletics, and three more games against the 12-24 Angels.
Only three of the six opponents have records over .500, so the Dodgers should breeze right through.
Injuries are a big hump to get over as well, and the Dodgers currently have five players battling issues. Right-hander Joe Kelly is overcoming a shoulder injury and can be activated off the 10-day injury list any day now, starter Walker Buehler is being activated after a hand injury, third baseman Justin Turner was placed on the 10-day list with a left hamstring strain, right-hander Pedro Baez is overcoming a groin injury and should be activated soon, and center fielder Cody Bellinger is listed as day-to-day with a lat injury that is keeping him out of some games.
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If the playoffs started today, the Dodgers would face the winner of the Padres and St. Louis Cardinals game, and if they win, would face the Chicago Cubs or Atlanta Braves. Their path to the pennant isn’t straight, but it can easily be one of the most talked about ones.