Chapter 20: 2022, The Goose flies south in October
The Dodgers have a historically good regular season. And then everything went wrong
The Dodgers didn’t defend their NL West title in 2021 as the Giants edged them out with an amazing 107 win season, beating out the Dodgers by one game. So I don’t have to write about that season. The Dodgers lost to Atlanta in the NLCS.
Dave Roberts was not happy not to have won the NL West and he and the Dodgers front office were determined to not let that happen again. Winning the division became even more important because the playoff expanded to six teams and only the two best divisions winners would receive a bye to the Division Series.
The Dodgers made a big free agent signing in the offseason as Atlanta moved on Freddie Freeman at first base in favor of Matt Olson. Freeman had a typical season for him with a .918 OPS. He picked up the slack for Cody Bellinger, who seemingly lost his swing who dropped all the way down to .654. Max Muncy, recovering from a major elbow injury the year before, batted .196, but did hit 21 homers and drew 90 walks.
The Dodgers pitching staff was solid with unexpected stars. Julio Urias was 17-7 with a 2.16 ERA. Tyler Anderson, a little heralded free agent acquisition, went 15-5 with a 2.57 ERA and made the All-Star team. Tony Gonsolin was 16-1 with a 2.40 ERA.
But there were some major injuries. Walker Buehler blew out his elbow and required a second Tommy John surgery. Clayton Kershaw missed some time with shoulder and back injuries.
The Dodgers bullpen added Craig Kimbrel as its closer and it didn’t go well. Kimbrel did manage to get 22 saves, but had an ERA of 3.75 and made fans sweat out many games. Eventually, Kimbrel would become so ineffective that he was left off the Dodgers postseason roster.
The season started a little late, April 8, because of a long lockout that most feared would result in the cancellation of regular season games. But, the players and owners settled in time to get in all 162.
Of those 162 games, the Dodgers won 111, the most in franchise history. They were never behind by more than 1 1/2 games and ended up winning the division by 22 games over the Padres.
Another blow to the Dodgers came on August 2, 2022, when Vin Scully passed away at the age of 94.
The new playoff structure in MLB created a bracket and teams were seeded. Since the Dodgers had the top seed, they were slated to play the winner of the best of three series between the top two wild cards: the Mets (who tied with Atlanta with 101 wins) and the Padres (89 wins). In an upset, the Padres beat the Mets in three games.
And now there would be a repeat of the contentious 2020 NLDS between the two teams, except that it would be played in home stadiums.
The Dodgers had Urias start the first game. The Padres were forced to use their fourth starter, Mike Clevenger. The Dodgers jumped on Clevenger for five runs by the third inning. That was enough as Los Angeles won Game 1 5-3.
Game 2 was a matchup of Kershaw and erstwhile Dodger Yu Darvish. The teams were tied 3-3 after five innings when Kershaw left the game in favor of Brusdar Graterol. The Padres parlayed a Trea Turner error into a run when Jurisckson Profar drove in Wil Myers. In the eighth, Blake Treinen, who missed nearly all of the regular season but made the playoff roster gave up a homer to Jake Cronenworth to make the second game another 5-3 score, but this one in favor of the Padres.
During Game 2, a goose flew into Dodger Stadium and briefly took up residence in right field. And decades of baseball analytics went up in smoke as San Diego celebrated its lucky goose.
The teams traveled down I-5 and probably said to themselves “Why is there always so much traffic around Carlsbad? What’s the deal?”
There would be no return trip where each team would have to face the decision “Do we take the 5 or go inland on the 15?”
Game 3 was played at a raucous Petco Park. Gonsolin started for the Dodgers against Blake Snell of the Padres. The Padres jumped on Gonsolin in the first on a Juan Soto double and another RBI from Cronenworth. Gonsolin would be out after giving up two hits in the second.
Andrew Heaney relieved and surrendered a 4th inning homer to Trent Grisham. In the fifth, the Dodgers had second and third with no outs and Mookie Betts up. All the Dodgers would get would be a sacrifice fly. Four Padre relievers pitched the last 3 2/3 innings and gave up just one hit. The Padres won the game 2-1 and had the Dodgers down in the series 2-1.
For Game 4, Anderson made the start against Joe Musgove. The Dodgers had a 3-0 lead in the seventh. And then came the bullpen meltdown.
Roberts brought in Tommy Kahnle to start the seventh. He had pitched just 12 2/3 innings all season, but had postseason experience with the Yankees. Kahnle faced the bottom of the order and walked Profar, gave up single to Grisham, and then let catcher Austin Nola drive in the Padres first run.
Yency Almonte relieved. Almonte had sported an ERA of 1.02 giving up just 4 runs in 35 innings. Almonte gave up a double to Ha-Seong Kim that scored Grisham to make it 3-2. Soto followed with a single to tie the game at 3-3. Almonte settled down to retire Manny Machado and Brandon Drury.
Roberts then tried to gain the platoon advantage brining in the left Alex Vesia to face Cronenworth. Soto stole second and he and Kim would score on a single by Cronenworth. The Padres were up 5-3.
The Dodgers had six more outs to rally. But they went out in order in each inning with Josh Hader striking out the side to end it and give the Padres a massive upset playoff win over their rivals up the freeway.
The playoff loss lead to much finger pointing. Roberts use of relievers in the seventh inning of Game 4 was considered suspect even though all the pitchers used in that inning had been pretty good. The Dodgers best reliever, Evan Phillips, didn’t pitch until the eighth by which time the horse was out of the barn and frolicking somewhere in the Gaslamp District.
But the bigger problem for the Dodgers was the lack of offense. Aside from a poor start from Clevenger in Game 1, the Dodgers had little in the way of offense against the Padres. The Padres didn’t create much offense on either.
Did the Dodgers World Series win in 2020 buy them any goodwill from fans for failing in the playoffs in two straight years? The answer was no. The Dodgers had reacquired the reputation as being a team that somehow lacked the necessary abilities to win in the postseason. Dave Roberts was regarded as poor tactician. Clayton Kershaw was never going to be a 1988 Orel Hershiser or 2014 Madison Bumgarner.
As we learned from Spider-Man that with great power comes great responsibility. The Dodgers were perceived as a team with power, but no responsibility.
Or maybe they were a team that just gave up runs at the wrong times in an unpredictable sport.
In 2023, the Dodgers would try to win without a lot of pitching. But that story has not yet been finished.
Thank you so much Bob. I really enjoyed this series. Ever since I discovered Dodger Thoughts I have always appreciated your knowledge and views on the Dodgers.
Bravo! Thanks Bob for an excellent series of posts. It summed up my baseball watching, Dodger loving fandom so neatly (but not always painlessly).
I am now ready for the possible exciting adventures ahead for the 2023 Dodger post-season.