Pitchers Limiting Dodgers’ Offense By Avoiding Fastballs

The Los Angeles Dodgers have been in an offensive rut as of late, which has led to them scoring just one run in their last 18 innings and just 20 runs across their last seven games, an average of fewer than three per game.

In that stretch, they are just 2-5 and face being swept by the St. Louis Cardinals in the series finale on Sunday before heading to San Diego for what should be a difficult series against the Padres.

Although the offense has been a strong point for the Dodgers throughout the year as they lead MLB in runs scored, their current skid began with a matchup against Ryan Yarbrough. The soft-tossing left-hander kept the Dodger off balance all game and limited them to just one run on four hits over six innings.

Yarbrough utilized his offspeed pitches well and avoided the fastball in key moments, which caused issues for the Dodgers that other pitchers have copied, manager Dave Roberts said on SportsNet LA:

“I think that’s kind of the thought across baseball, really. When you get guys on base, to go soft. Not just us. So obviously Yarbs started it over there, but I think you’ve seen that a lot. At times we’re better at not chasing to get pitchers into our hitting zone. And other times we’re not. So I think we’ve just got to get back to that.”

In that outing, Yarbrough went to his fastball just 11 times on his 93 pitches. He primarily relied on his cutter and sweeper, recording 17 whiffs on 43 swings, good for an elite 43% whiff rate.

“Well, the thing with Yarbrough that’s always been interesting about him is he might only be throwing mid 80s, but it feels so much harder than that,” Max Muncy said after the loss on June 1. “He’s a tall guy and he’s got long arms, so he’s got good extension and the funky delivery with the low slot. So it always made his ball feel a lot harder than what it actually is.

“And he was locating his stuff, he was mixing it well, keeping us off balance. And then in the middle of that game, you start getting some tough visuals out there.”

The following day, Paul Blackburn shut them down for five innings while allowing just three hits in a victory for the New York Mets. Blackburn relied on a cutter and changeup heavily in that game.

“I think the common thread is you’ve got guys that don’t throw the ball hard, that pitch backward, that use their breaking ball, changeup, cutter,” Roberts said after that game on June 2. “Guys are timed up for velocity. No excuse, you’ve still got to find a way to hit those guys. We had some bad at-bats tonight. There were some bad strikeouts.

“You’ve got to give Blackburn credit for answering the call. Yeah, the last couple nights against starters, that you would think on paper — and you don’t play on paper, I get that — but we still had our chances tonight.”

Against the Mets, the Dodgers averaged just four runs per game across the series, and they were also limited to just one run in the third game. Roberts attributed their success to some of his players being too locked in on the fastball and not making adjustments.

“I think it’s player to player,” Roberts began. “Some guys understand that, and you can hunt different things. Some guys work on a strategy of hope. That, ‘I hope they throw a fastball…’

“So you’ve got to be willing to hunt different pitches or shift the field, whatever kind of language that resonates with a hitter. But the honest truth is that these guys have pitched us really well.”

Avoiding fastballs working against Shohei Ohtani

While the offense has been all-around bad in the seven games, Ohtani’s struggles have stood out when the rest of the club is relying on him to help spark them.

He’s hitting just .259/.323/.370 in that stretch with one home run and two RBI. To limit him, opponents have been avoiding the fastball.

“I think that they’re just really not throwing fastballs in the hitting zone, to be honest with you,” Roberts said. “If something is in the strike zone, it’s spin or a changeup, and they’re changing a lot of locations. They’re going in, crowding him, and they’re going away. So they’re just not repeating a lot.”