LOS ANGELES — Matt Kemp continues to be the Los Angeles Dodgers only piece of offense, delivering again in a 9-5 rout of the Arizona Diamondbacks. Kemp is making himself a likely candidate for NL MVP, leading in RBI’s (80) and second in homeruns, trailing only Lance Berkman (27) by two.
In the game, Kemp went 2 for 5 with five-RBI’s. He hit a three-run homerun in the third-inning to give the Dodgers a 3-1 lead. In the fourth, all three Dodgers batters that reached base did so unintentionally as Eugenio Velez was walked and both Rafael Furcal and Andre Ethier were hit by pitches to load the bases for the MVP candidate.
With two-outs, Kemp smacked a line-drive into center, bringing in two more runs for 5-2 lead after four. But like other sensible MVP candidates, Kemp would trade all his numbers among his teammates to position the Dodgers in a better state than they currently sit (48-57, 4th).
Arizona got things rolling with a solo homerun by Ryan Roberts in second.
In the fourth, Justin Upton reached second on a throwing error by Dodger starter, Ted Lilly. With Chris Young’s groundout advancing Upton to third, Xavier Nady’s RBI-single cut the Diamondbacks deficit to one.
The fifth through the seventh-innings saw Arizona score a run in each frame. Willie Bloomquist and Upton both had solo shots in the fifth and seventh respectively. Chris Young’s leadoff walk in the sixth would eventually come around the bases. Young took second on a wild pitch by Los Angeles reliever, Blake Hawksworth, scoring on Robert’s RBI-single.
However, after the stretch with the Dodgers only leading by a run, Los Angeles would unload on Arizona relief pitcher, Alberto Castillo, for three-runs in the inning.
James Loney hit a one-out single and Dioner Navarro would walk before Tony Gwynn’s hit was misplayed by Upton allowing Loney to score and advance both Navarro and Gwynn into scoring position for Jamey Carroll. Carroll’s sacrifice-fly advanced both runners on the play giving the Dodgers an 8-5 lead. Furcal followed with a RBI-double to further increase Los Angeles’ lead at 9-5 which also ended up being the final.
July 30th, 2011 at 12:05 pm
Also from MLBTR: “seriously you better flip aviles for justin upton right now or i will do nothing at all and just be kinda sour about it”
August 4th, 2011 at 9:17 am
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August 4th, 2011 at 5:22 pm
Eric,
Great insight on the Dodgers. It will be interesting to see if the Baseball writers will weigh Kemp’s strong numbers over a slugger who is playing in October. Here are some visuals that depict the NL MVP candidates: http://experiencesap.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=458&action=edit&message=1
SAP has created some new analytics that can easily generate graphics for Baseball stats. Please feel free to use our tools to further enhance your future Dodgers analysis: http://experience.sap.com/baseball/index.htm
Cheers,
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