Dodgers: Cody Bellinger Held Out of the Lineup for Second Straight Game
The Dodgers will be without their former MVP for yet another game today. After being held out of the lineup on Tuesday night, Dave Roberts announced once again that Cody Bellinger would sit.
Bellinger had felt something in his lat muscle taking a swing that caused the staff to hold him out. While it didn’t warrant any testing or worry at the time, sitting out another game does slightly elevate it. The Dodgers are sitting Belli again with no intention of getting him into the game.
The good news is that Bellinger did take swings today in the batting cages and felt good. Dave Roberts confirmed that he very well could have been in the Dodgers lineup if they really needed him. As of now, the move is to play it safe with him.
Cody Bellinger will still bot be in the lineup with the lat soreness.
Took swings in the cages today and felt good, but playing it safe.
— Dodgers Nation (@DodgersNation) September 2, 2020
The Dodgers have Max Muncy playing first base today while AJ Pollock will man centerfield. There is no expectation as of now that he will have to hit the injured list or that he will have to miss any more time. If he misses tomorrow, then maybe a little more concern will creep in.
Cody had a tough start to the short season but had really started hitting the ball well lately. Bellinger cranked 10 homeruns in the month of August alone, putting together a .255 batting average in the process. While he’s still a ways off from his MVP numbers, the hard contact has slowly shown up. More importantly, his strikeouts have gone down over the last few weeks as well.
The Dodgers will play one more game against Arizona after tonight before starting a series with the Rockies in Los Angeles this weekend. Los Angeles has a five-game lead over the Padres heading into Wednesday night’s game.
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I guess I’ve seen enough baseball that now and then I mention to my wife that there seems to be something wrong with one player or another and sometimes more than one player. Bellinger was one of them a few weeks ago if not a month or so. He just didn’t look the same in many ways his swing, his throwing, and his speed. he seemed to pick it up here and there but not like progressively. He’d look good then not, back and forth. This is what I had talked about before. Players know something is wrong or just not right physically but don’t mention it to anyone and if another player knows, he’s probably told not to say anything. It’s happened before, no surprise. I can see a couple of other players that may have a problem physically or mentally, they’re just not into the game.
Bellinger has a whip-like swing and you can see how it puts a lot of torque on his body. I imagine as long as he swings like that he will occasionally have those same ligament and muscle strains its not a natural movement the way he cranks his torso.
Many players have a smooth motion Bellinger does not