The Los Angeles Dodgers are in a bit of a pickle as the final stretch of the regular season is underway.
While going 10-12 since the All-Star break, their lead in the NL West has shrunk to just one game over the San Diego Padres. Miscues on defense and leaving the 12th-highest amount of runners on base in baseball have led to inexcusable losses lately.
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As for the Friars, they have gone 15-8 since the Midsummer Classic and fortified their roster with an extremely active trade deadline. All-Star third baseman Max Muncy recently spoke on the fleeting lead in the division and what his team must do to snap out of their recent skid.
“It’s not going well for us right now. We got to find a way to snap out of it. No one’s going to feel sorry for us. So it’s on us to find our way out of it, and we need to do it,” Muncy said.
“I’ll let you guys scoreboard watch for me. You’ve heard me say it a million times, we try to focus on what’s going on here and on this field. We don’t worry about what’s going on anywhere else. It sucks, but we have to focus on ourselves. We can’t worry about what anyone else is doing. We have to focus on ourselves, and like I said, we got to snap out of what’s going on.”
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The same story told all season about stars being unavailable due to injury continues to ring true at this point in the season, but with players like Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow and even Muncy recently returning from a lengthy time away, there can be no excuses for those that take the field each game.
With that being said, there are still plenty of options awaiting a return to the field, like NLCS MVP Tommy Edman, relievers Tanner Scott, Kirby Yates, Michael Kopech, right-hander Roki Sasaki, and of course, fan favorite infielder Hyeseong Kim.
Regardless of who is on the lineup card each game, nothing can get in the way of the Dodgers putting runs on the board and continuing to play their brand of baseball each game.
If not, they’ll soon be looking up at the Padres in the NL West — an unfamiliar sight for a team that’s won 11 of the last 12 division titles.
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Photo Credit: William Liang-Imagn Images
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