Mar-teen!
For the first few innings of Saturday's 7-5 win over the Nationals, it looked like L.A.'s strategy to keep yesterday's momentum alive was to have today's game last literally forever. I'm telling you, this sucker moved slower than Star Jones through the buffet line at Sizzler. To call what starters Derek Lowe and Mike O'Connor were doing on the mound "laboring" would make actual labor fly by like spring break in comparison. After Felipe Lopez singled on a slow roller and stole second (a recurring theme for the day), Lowe struck out Ryan Zimmerman before Nick Johnson deposited a hanger over the center field wall. 2-0 Nats.
In the second, Lowe allowed two more runs, this time on four hits. By the end of the inning, his pitch count was higher than fans at a Phish concert. Fortunately for the Dodgers, he'd settle down, mowing through the fourth and fifth before leaving for a pinch hitter. Even more fortunate for the Blue was the performance of O'Connor, who snotted on the lead he was spotted by allowing four Dodger runs in the home half of the first, including two homers. First a Rafael Furcal shot to lead off the game, then a two-run bomb from Russell Martin.
Grady Little praised Lowe for getting stronger as the game went on. "It was far from a breeze. But a lot of times you see when pitchers get to about 75 pitches you see their stuff decline. But today he was totally the opposite," he said. "If we hadn't pinch hit for him in the fifth inning to try and pad our lead, he would have been out there for the sixth." It's not surprising to see Little find the silver lining in what was a shaky outing, and Lowe does deserve some credit for at least keeping the wheels attached to the bus. Wobbling, slightly deflated, and on cracked axles, but still attached. But if the Dodgers are going to climb back into the race in the West, there's no doubt Lowe is going to have to get his problems worked out.
From Lowe's end, he didn't think things were quite as bad as the box would indicate, but knows he need to pitch better. "It's been a tough six weeks," he said. More importantly, he knows he needs to do a better job keeping guys close from the stretch. Washington runners were stealing so easily off him, I swear the last of the five swipes he surrendered advanced while crab walking. "In my case, it's always on the pitcher. It's something that I've really got to work on, especially with runners on second base," Lowe said. Martin didn't point fingers, instead pointing to his own mechanics. It could be his feet, or diplomacy, or both. "If guys get good jumps, it's my job to make a better throw. I've just got to work on my footwork a little. I think it's getting a little slow. That's probably something I'm going to work on in the next couple days to get back on track," he said. "Throwing to bases is one of my favorite things to do, and I take a lot of pride in it. I think I should throw every runner out."
Jonathan Broxton worked the ninth for his first Major League save. But Takashi Saito fans need not worry. This was a temporary gig for the husky right hander. According to Little, "Saito was unavailable today. He's taking a couple days to recover from that outing on Wednesday afternoon where he overloaded his circuits there a little bit. But he should be ready to go out there tomorrow." See what a two game run will do? Already, they're talking about who will close the third win! As far as I could tell, Saito's rest was both for physical and mental reasons after throwing 37 pitches in his last outing. "That's many more than he's used to having to throw, and it caught up with him," Little said. Not hard to believe the guy could get fried by one long outing, considering how little he's pitched since, oh, mid-June.
Martin's four RBI paced the Dodgers, but his wasn't the only notable performance. Rafael Furcal had two hits, as did Jason Repko (who also played a solid game in center, tracking down a number of balls, making a nice throw to hold a runner at third, and wisely deciding not to climb the wall in pursuit of Johnson's homer). Elmer Dessens continued to pitch well in blue, going 2.1 scoreless innings before Broxton closed out the game.
Okay, now that all that baseball is out of the way, it's onto the big question of the day. What the hell was up with the "French-Canadian" accent Andre Ethier broke out over the Fox airwaves as L.A.'s miked player after Martin's homer? When I asked him about it, he tried to play it off. "Russell Mar-teen? He's my favorite French-Canadian player. My grandparents came from Quebec, so for old times sakes, for all the Ethier relatives back on that side of the country, I gave them a little shout out. A little French shout out." He was doing the best he could. "I only know a couple French words, and some aren't the best. But I know Mar-teen. I think I had the accent down, though." When I mentioned that the blog, along with Steve Lyons, couldn't tell if it was French or Mexican, Ethier didn't break stride. "I guess I'm trying to appeal to this side of the country. The demographic around here. You have to play to the local crowd," he laughed. Fortunately, there's no category in the ROY voting for accent work.
Martin wasn't surprised by the bad performance. "I'm trying to teach him some French, but he needs a little more work, I think."
Will there be more on the game tomorrow? Oui.
BK
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Merci beacoup, monsieur!! Ce va bien en le monde de les Dodgers ajourd’hui!!!
Posted by: LoLo | July 29, 2006 at 05:58 PM
Okay, I don't mean to be girly but I'm scared. The dodgers have won 2 in a row! 2 in a row! The apocalypse might be coming lol.
"'In my case, it's always on the pitcher. It's something that I've really got to work on, especially with runners on second base,' Lowe said"
I love hearing accountability, in my opinion not enough people do so/say so (in general). Whether it was his fault or not isn't the point. Go Lowe!
Posted by: Faith | July 29, 2006 at 06:07 PM
Don't look now, but we will only be 5 games back with a SD loss today.
Posted by: LoLo | July 29, 2006 at 06:20 PM
Yeah, I like Lowe's honesty, too. But how long has he been in the majors? Just now has figured out it is something he should work on?
But, I give him a slight pass, due to his ADD. I still don't know what else there is to concentrate on when pitching, but nevertheless...
Again the "brain trust" comes into play, specifically Rick Honeycutt. You haven't worked with him on this obvious weakness? What do you do, Rick, besides give bad advice?
Posted by: Dodgerdog | July 29, 2006 at 06:53 PM
Lowe hasn't pitched well since he started growing the scruff on his face. Maybe if he cleans up his act, he'll pitch better. I look at him and ask, "Whatever happened to the clean cut Dodgers of O'Malley folklore?
On a side note -- ESPN is reporting the Nationals made a trade offer to the Dodgers for Soriano, but it was way out of the ballpark. They also report the Dodgers counteroffered and it was left at that.
Has anyone heard any rumors on this?
Todd Zeil says Soriano's best fit would be in LA!
Posted by: Bob Smith aka Garvey for President | July 29, 2006 at 07:24 PM
Tejada offer from Dodgers was rejected. Several players involved. Orioles want three to four players in any deal.
Question, would you have turned down a Tejada for Ervin Santana and Aybar trade?
Posted by: Bob Smith aka Garvey for President | July 29, 2006 at 07:28 PM
Drew hitting a grand slam doesn't mean he is out of a slump...take that hit away and he hasn't done anything.
Posted by: Tom | July 29, 2006 at 07:32 PM
If Saito was unavailable, then why was he warming up in the 9th after Broxton gave up a single to Ryan Zimmerman?
But, on a positive note, amazing what adding 2 decent arms (Dessens and Tomko)has tranformed the bullpen. No, they won't be unscored upon the rest of the year, but having 4 guys (add Broxton and Saito to the mix)should make managing the final 9 outs more doable.
Be honest, can you see Baez and Odalis doing what Dessens and Broxton did today? The added depth paid dividends right away. Hopefully, they can keep it up.
Wonder when Odalis' first start is with KC?
Posted by: Dodgerdog | July 29, 2006 at 09:11 PM
OK, fans. Odalis' first start is scheduled for Monday vs the White Sox.
Can't wait for the post-game comments.
Posted by: Dodgerdog | July 29, 2006 at 09:33 PM
I'll see your Odalis comment and raise it, Dodgerdog: Can't wait to see how many innings the Big Oh lasts. Two? Three?
Posted by: wmm | July 29, 2006 at 09:39 PM
Anyone know who the Dodgers offered up for Tejada? Where would he play? Must include furcal, don't you think?
Posted by: Fish Guy | July 29, 2006 at 10:13 PM
just a thought guys. do you think that the dodgers next big bat will come by trade from the d-rays? can the dodgers possibly pick up CF carl crawford from the d-rays after they possibly deal either cruz or ledee to the yanks(wish it was drew instead)? the rays may not be able to re sign SS julio lugo, so if we had to get rid of izzy, maybe we can trade for crawford?
story is from http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/5829168
All indications are that the Devil Rays are going to fail in their efforts to sign potential free-agent shortstop Julio Lugo to a contract extension. But the Rays also are at a standstill in their trade talks with the Blue Jays, and trading Lugo to the Red Sox could be problematic if Lugo balks at moving to second base, a position he hasn't played with any frequency since 2000.
If the Sox acquired Lugo, they likely would trade second baseman Mark Loretta, possibly to the Cardinals. However, the Cardinals' first choice at second seems to be the Indians' Ronnie Belliard, who recently missed six games with a hamstring injury, but returned to the lineup on Saturday night.
The Cardinals rank next-to-last in the National League in on-base/slugging percentage at second base.
Posted by: THE WOLF | July 30, 2006 at 02:17 AM
That was nice of Martin to immediately throw the ball back to Brox after the Big Boy got his 1st career save. It's the little things that Russ does that impress me the most about his character and willingness to put the team above everything. He seems to always be looking out for his teamates. Kinds reminds me of another short-stalky catcher we had just a few years back. I think his name was Loduca, or something like that.
Posted by: LoLo | July 30, 2006 at 04:33 AM
Fish guy,
Tejada is a weird situation because the guy is under contract for a couple more years, yet the team is willing to move him. I think the brunt of the desire to move him stems from the offseason fiasco with him criticizing management about not acquiring enough talented players to win and subsequently his demand to be traded (then the reports that he had backed off his demand, only to be reported that he was demanding a trade once again). If that is the reason that management is moving him then who knows what they are asking for. I haven’t seen any firm reports as to what the Orioles want in return (prospects, rookies, starters, or a combination of the 3), but the Angels just nixed a package, so I’m curious to see what they offered. If Tejada is being moved for financial reasons then it is doubtful that they would take on a salary like Furcal’s. In that case, a package that includes Izzy would most likely be what they would ask from us.
Again, I don’t know what the motivation is behind making Tejada available, but I’m sure AK/BK can provide better insight on that.
Posted by: LoLo | July 30, 2006 at 04:46 AM
Please, please, please tell me that the Dodgers were not showcasing Broxton yesterday for a possible trade.
Dear Ned, do not make the Pedro trade of the 21st Century.
Broxton should soon become the closer for a long time to come.
Posted by: Paul | July 30, 2006 at 10:09 AM
LoLo,
How's this for motivation to move Tejada? They've had him, what, three years, and have never gotten anywhere. Time to move on, get something in return.
Actually, they've got plenty of $$$. How much did MLB pay them to "let" the Nationals into their Baltimore/DC territory?
Poor decisons have hurt them as they try to compete with the Yankees and Red Sox. To make matters worse, Toronto made some good moves and has passed them.
Posted by: Dodgerdog | July 30, 2006 at 10:21 AM
I hear that Tejada's contract is really backloaded, so he could be really expensive the next few years. Also heard that he doesn't want to play 3rd. Does that mean moving Furcal to 2nd? what happens to Kent? Looks like they won't fork it out for Nomar next year.
Posted by: Fish Guy | July 30, 2006 at 10:44 AM