The Narnia 3 Blog

Wait Until Next Year

With the Dodgers losing a double header today against Colorado, the slim chances they had to make the playoffs are essentially gone. They would pretty much have to win out the season (11-0) and even with that the best they can do on their own is gain 3 games on Arizona (whom they currently trail by 5 1/2 games).

Waiting until next year is sort of common for Dodger fans, but next year will be the 50th Anniversary of the team coming to Los Angeles and the 20th Anniversary of their last World Series appearance, so perhaps the numbers are coming together.

For next year the Dodgers are pretty much set on position players. Gonzalez will not be back, and Nomar will hopefully retire or accept the fact that he is going to be a bench player. Hopefully next spring Furcal can get through Spring training without injuring himself; his ankle was never good all year, and if you remember Jason Repko (who collided with him) wasn't able to play this year at all. If Kent is used properly and rested sufficiently alternating with Abreu, it looks like he has another good year left. The key will be Loney, Ethier, and Kemp playing everyday, all year. Add to that mix LaRoche at third everyday all year and maybe letting Liberthal play just a little bit more and resting Martin (for his own good), they should put up enough offense. I've complained enough about Pierre, but we're stuck with him, so as long as Ethier and Kemp are in the outfield that should be enough defense. I do hope Repko is back healthy though next year. An outfield of Ethier, Repko, and Kemp; at least once in a while, would be nice.

What killed the Dodgers this year was starting pitching. Losing Schmidt was bad, but it was complicated by their insistence on trying to make Tomko and Hendrickson work in the rotation, especially after Wolf was lost for the season (maybe the biggest loss). The result was they never had a winning streak longer than 5 games all year. The other issue was a bullpen that was used way to much and too often. Billingsley (11-5 and 3.10 ERA) should have started all year. So next year what do we have? Lowe, Penny and Bilingsley are set. Schmidt probably should not be counted on for much and may not even be ready for spring training. Clayton Kershaw will be 20 and is the consensus best pitching prospect in all of the minor leagues. Does he jump from AA, where he spent all but the last month, to the majors next year?

The one unknown is the odd and irritating penchant Ned Colletti has for insisting on older players (look where that theory got the Giants). He nearly killed Loney by sending him back to AAA at the beginning of the season. He went out and spent $10 million on an unnecessary left fielder, when Ethier would have certainly put up better numbers than Gonzalez, and Kemp wasn't going to learn anything at Las Vegas. And, of course he signed Pierre before he knew Repko would be lost all season. It seems that he has to be forced into allowing younger guys to play. If he sticks with Nomar and starts LaRoche in AAA next year it will be a clear sign he didn't learn anything this year.

Hopefully he won't spend a bunch of money on an unneeded position player, unless A-Rod opts out and he wants to try for him. If a front line starting pitcher is available that would be a good investment. But please Ned, let the kids play next year!