Finally!!!

Photo by Jack Dempsey, AP

After bashing James Loney last night, he finally made me eat my words, at least for one night. The Garbage Man hit a 3-run home run in the fourth inning, his first since July 10th, or last time the swallows came back to San Juan Capistrano. Ethier had his 6th multi-homer game of the season, hitting his 26th and 27th, and could go .300/30/100 this season. Wolf pitched another masterpiece and earned his third victory in a row, this time without having to provide his own run support. After Kershaw had a wonderful month and a half, Wolf has been the proxy ace in the pitching staff in August, especially with the injury to Kuroda and disappearance of early-season Billingsley.

The Dodgers push the Rockies back to 3 games and have a chance to push them all the way back to 4 games by winning the rubber-game tomorrow.

"We look at it as all the pressure's on them. They're supposed to win the division. They were up by 15 1/2 . We're just messing around, I guess." -Troy Tulowitzki

Oh Troy. If the Rockies lose tomorrow, they could see their run cut short. Since the Jim Tracy has taken over, the Rockies have not hit a wall yet. That wall could come really soon. After tomorrow's game, they face the best of the Giants pitching staff, Lincecum, Cain, and a resurgent Zito at San Francisco, where the Giants have been swallowing up every team that they played against. Meanwhile, the Dodgers face the Reds on the road, and hopefully could get their licks against Homer Bailey and Bronson Arroyo. If somehow, the Dodgers take tomorrow's matinee and 2 out of 3 from the Reds, and the Rockies lose 3 out of the 3 from the Giants, the lead would be 6 games going into the final month of the season. If that should happen, the Rockies would have the Giants and Marlins chasing them down in the wildcard race.

The Garbage Man

(Photo by Tony Gutierrez, AP)

Most people who have been reading my posts or opinions on SOSG and TrueBlueLA know about how critical I have been on James Loney's offensive contribution, especially when the Dodgers did not make a push to get Victor Martinez or any other power-hitting first baseman. My main argument for getting some like Martinez is that the Dodgers lineup didn't need any more contact hitters. Instead, they would benefit more from someone who had pretty good power numbers, either with hitting homers or from slugging. Loney was a one-bag type of hitters, but had a pretty decent year, until the trade deadline.

Since the trade deadline, Loney has not had the best numbers: 15 for 71 (.211), 9 BB, 0 HR, 8 RBIs through today's game. Bad month but not terrible, right? If you take away the first three games of the month when he had 3 multi-hit games in a row, his numbers are as bad as it gets: 8 for 57 (.140), 0 HR, 3 RBIs in the past 17 games.

Tonight, he went 0 for 5, the only Dodgers position player without a base-hit. Also, he made a critical error in the bottom of the 10th that pretty much dashed all hopes of a victory.

I know I have been too critical on Loney, but why can't I be? I mean he is no Andruw Jones, right? The way he has been playing recently, he is Jones sans the expensive price tag. He did hit that grand slam last season in the playoffs and probably is hitting the worst slump of his young career. However, sometimes I still wonder how good would this team be if we had Martinez, Adrian Gonzalez, or even Adam Dunn batting behind Manny.

Sorry Loney, losing some games make the fans a little critical of you. I have been calling you Garbage Man from my seat in Field Box 53 every time you fail to drive in a run or get a base-hit. Please prove me wrong soon.

A Night With Friends

Nothing is better than watching baseball at the ballpark with some old friends, having a beer and doing some reminiscing about college. Tracy is from Chicago and Isaac lived there for the past two years. Naturally, Miss Sula is a Cubs fan and wore her personalized jersey. Eveytime she got up, she was promptly booed by all the people around us in Loge, which was oddly enjoyable.

We began our night by eating some very nice Chicago deep dish pizza at Masa in Echo Park for half-price, in commemoration of the Cubs being in town. The game was close until Russell Martin hit a grand slam in the sixth inning. I had no idea why the Cubs intentionally walked James Loney, who has been struggling for the past several weeks. Probably to induce a double-play, but they got burned severely. Tracy was not pleased, and Isaac instantly turned into a Dodgers fan.

We ended the night having a round of drinks at Mountain Bar in Chinatown. Issac is off to graduate school at Seoul National University next week, so I wish him all the best. It was another wonderful day that started at Royal/T for lunch and ended at the stadium and the dive bar. Everything was great except the horrible traffic everywhere I went.

Off to Kemp Bobblehead Night

Truthfully, I am more psyched about this bobblehead than even the Manny one. Hopefully, there will be some Kemp heroics that would result in a Dodgers win in the rubber game against the Cardinals. I might try to hit up Crooks on Saturday to see Kemp and Loney's t-shirt collab. Hope there isn't too insane of a line.

Here is the collab shirts from Crooks' Twitter: