unless he is hurting, i believe its just a slump. it happens. i thought Hanley was supposed to "protect" Matt?(i dont buy into the protection thing myself)
sorry, the blood was boiling last night after that pathetic loss
well, contrary to what some might think; I was disappointed, and any "anger", or as some might say, angre, I might have would not be with another fan, but the pathetic up and down of the offensive offense!
Kemp IS pressing. The longer a slump goes the harder it is to get out of it because the players starts trying to do too much. In the big AB with Kemp (I don't remember what inning, but it was late in the game), I predicted his SO thus: I told my kid "Kemp is slumping. He's something like 0-18 and he wants a hit really bad. He's getting impatient (*the key statement). He wants to swing that bat so bad and do something, but most likely what will happen is that he'll chase a bad pitch way out of the strike zone for the strike out."
Booom. Sure enough. He'll be back soon enough. Guaranteed they're working with him to try and get him out of his own head and to just relax. Hopefully he'll come out of his slump soon. We can't have Kemp in a prolonged slump, especially with Ethier all but disappearing.
I agree. I've never been a fan of the "make the pitcher work" philosophy. We saw the drawback to that last night. Oh yeah, Bumgarner worked - he threw over 100 pitches in 8 scoreless innings. By contrast, in Atlanta, the Dodgers hit 3 HR back-to-back-to-back on 3 first pitches.
These guys take way too many hittable pitches. For as good as Mark Ellis has been, I think he could be better if he'd be a little more aggresive. Maybe he'd have a better average. Maybe a few more HR.
"..True, but that's why the Hanley move was so important. It enables us to survive periods when Kemp is slumping...."
True. But can we survive with Kemp slumping and Ethier doing his best Loney impression? I"m more worried about the Ethier disappearing act than Kemp's lump right now.
Matt will come around. I don't worry about him. Ethier concerns me though as well. The great thing about the Hanley addition is that he was once in the Cabrera/Kemp type of bracket, and with his offensive production since joining the team he's showing that type of level. It's huge for the club.
Vin kept emphasizing last night during his broadcast Ethier's numbers since June. He was comparing him to Pence, who is also dragging.
The thing that the Dodgers have really lucked out about too is that certain guys (not really prime time players) have gotten hot at the most opportune times. We had a number of players do that in the early months. Now Cruz is providing a lift.
But down the stretch we really need a significant contribution from Ethier.
I sure hope you're right. The Dodgers need Kemp, Ethier, and Hanley to produce or they're gonna have little chance.
Boy, Blanton looks like garbage doesn't he? I sure hope that the Dodgers aren't gonna have to count on him for a crucial game to clinch the division, or a playoff game.
Kemp is in a slump because he's trying to pull everything thrown up to him. He exibits little patience and is, again, swinging at the slider down and away with a twist, also, down and in. When he, again, figures this out, he'll be back to mashing. Also, the 'law of averages' eventually show up.
The whole team at some point, needs to go on a streak of winning games. 8,9,10 in a row and peak in performance right into the play offs. We can not be .500 from this point on. We at least need to start playing .750 ball. Maybe the previous roadtrip success was a start. If we take two out of three from the Gnats, we'll be on that road. But, they need to win 7 of 10 and do it all over again to the play offs. Anything less and we'll probably miss the play offs this year.