Dodgers: Cody Bellinger Will See Some Time at First Base Again
It’s been a long road for the Dodgers trying to get Cody Bellinger back in the lineup. The superstar outfielder went down with an injury back on April 5th and has been out ever since. What started as a day-to-day thing turned into a long stint on the IL when a small fracture was discovered.
But the good news is that Bellinger is back in the Dodgers lineup and 100 percent ready. Dave Roberts said over and over that they would not bring him back until he was at a place where he could hit the ground running. Quite literally.
Bellinger is expected to be in the Dodgers lineup for the next 5 games, leading up to their off-day on Thursday. But there is a chance that Roberts changes his positioning to get him off of his legs at some point. Doc revealed that Belli could see some time at first base again, a position he came up playing.
#Dodgers manager Dave Roberts says he could see Cody Bellinger playing the next five games, with one of those likely coming at first base
— Juan Toribio (@juanctoribio) May 29, 2021
While Bellinger has his Gold Glove award for his time in right field, first base is a position that comes very naturally to him. He spent 143 innings there in 2020 during the shortened season for the Dodgers.
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Getting some reps at first base will give Bellinger a chance to rest his legs a little bit, which will be needed as he gets back into the grind of a season. But the good news is that he is healthy, and the Dodgers get another big weapon back into their line on a daily basis.
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I’m not sure batting Bellinger in the 4th spot is ideal at the outset of his return. Let him bat 6th like he did last year at least for a couple weeks.
You can only plug the holes in the dam with the bullpen so long before things bust wide open. After Urias yesterday,the middle relief couldn’t keep the game close. The bullpen game without a fifth starter is killing us and will eventually hurt the four starters being used every fifth day. Gonsolin maybe the answer, but they have to careful with TB,CK,WB, and JU. Trevor Bauer and Julio Urias were not same pitchers under the present circumstances. I can’t believe we have nobody in the minors or AF could’ve signed a pitcher to get through this rough stretch without a fifth starter. What if Gonsolin sucks when he comes up and starts or gets hurt, what then? The Padres are for real and the Giants will hang around just to make things interesting for them. They love beating us,
Can’t stand Joe Davis and his constant repetition of the same stats every game and Eric Karros’s negative Dodger comments. He pumps up the Giants. You would think he never played for the Dodgers,
Good comment, Andrew. I agree with your assessment of the pitching and the potential effect on our starters.
But I have say I think Bulldog (all due respect to his greatness in the mid-late eighties) is just terrible as a color analyst. He’s actually good at providing perspective from a pitcher’s point of view, but he is mostly, in a word, a fuddy-duddy who is obviously too spooked by his religion to be any fun whatsoever. He was a great pitcher, but not such an entertaining commentator. Hope the Dodgers will move on, soon…
Andrew, I fully agree with you about these BP games. Yesterday, at least Roberts could have let Mitch White finish that inning. But what does Roberts do? He brings in that Vesia and look what happened. The game got away and it’s on Roberts for the way he and the Dodgers are handling the pitching.