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The Los Angeles Dodgers haven’t had a great 2016 season so far. They’ve had trouble keeping the rebuilt “best rotation in baseball” healthy. Meanwhile, their offense has been the biggest weakness in the first half of 2016.
The only meaningful injury to a position player is to fourth outfielder Andre Ethier. He is expected to return some time after the All-Star break. Of course, they released starting left fielder Carl Crawford and have been using an unusual platoon alternating Howie Kendrick between left and second to allow youngster Trayce Thompson to share at-bats with veteran infielder Chase Utley. Lost in this situation: Kendrick has done an admirable job switching back and forth to allow Yasiel Puig to remain the everyday right fielder.
More than the outfield disintegration, the Dodgers, as a team, have had a bad outcome offensively so far this season. They are third worst in MLB in batting average and slugging percentage, and fourth worst in OPS. Even though they rank in the top 10 in walks, they are still in the bottom third in OBS thanks to that low batting average.
Yet, somehow, they are scoring enough to remain in command in the National League Wild Card chase. They are in the middle of the pack in both runs scored and home runs despite the low slugging percentage. That low slugging percentage is due to the low number of doubles combined with the low team batting average. Other than that, the Dodgers are a rather unremarkable offensive team. They are in the middle of the pack in strikeouts, so they don’t let the other teams off the hook that easily.
The discussion entering the 2016 season was whether the Dodgers could overcome the loss of Zack Greinke. Now the discussion is whether the Dodgers can produce enough runs to hold together an injured pitching staff. The longer they wait to find out, the further ahead the San Francisco Giants will get in the 2016 NL West race.
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