Mookie Betts sounds depressed, but he isn’t giving up at the plate

Mookie Betts offered a new perspective on Tuesday afternoon when he was collapsed for a season, it was not a collapse of a season.

In his opinion, he in fact returned to last season.

“I have really not been to the right since I came back from my hand last year,” said Betts.

Betts fractured his left hand in mid-June last season when he was struck by a fast 98-h / h ball. He was sidelined for almost two months.

The Dodgers Mookie Betts Dodgers stop looking at its stick gloves after flying in ninth round against the Minnesota twins at the Dodger Stadium on July 22.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

“Think about it,” said Betts. “Go watch. I haven’t been right since.”

Betts was a MVP candidate when he went down, hitting. 304 at the time. He beat. 263 after his return, including. 185 in the last 17 games of the regular season.

Last year’s troubles took place this year, in which he was beating a career. 236.

Betts wanted to clarify the point he was trying to assert.

“I didn’t blame him on my hand or anything,” he said. “I said just since my return, I haven’t done anything. It’s not just this season.”

Betts has even done everything possible to minimize the severity of the injury or how it has affected it since.

“It was not as if I had erased my hand,” he said. “It was a fracture.”

Betts underlined how his grip force was measured in training in the spring. Readings have shown that its grip was stronger than the previous year.

Dodgers Mookie Betts stop playing a game in a match against the Cardinals of St. Louis at Dodger Stadium on August 4.

(Luke Johnson / Los Angeles Times)

“There is no correlation with anything,” he said. “I would like to be able to blame him for something, but no.”

My visit to the Dodger stadium on Tuesday was invited to that Betts told journalists after a weekend series in Tampa. The remarks in question have been made when Betts has been certain in his last four games; The sequence extended to a career summit of five after another match without a safe blow on Monday against the Cardinals of St. Louis.

“I did everything I can do,” Betts told journalists. “It is to God at this stage.”

In the impression, at least, he looked defeated. His quotes, I told him, were depressed.

“I don’t know if you look at what’s going on, but it’s depressing,” said Betts with a smile.

So he still had a sense of humor.

Which does not mean that he is neither disconcerted nor frustrated by his lack of production.

“It’s inexplicable,” said Betts. “I don’t know. It sucks. You know how in Space Jam, they take your superpowers?

Without any specific response, he doubled on the general philosophy which made him one of the greatest players in baseball.

He worked.

“This is the only thing I can do,” he said. “The only thing I can control is my effort and my attitude.”

When Betts says he is do All he could do to resume his old magic, what he really says is that he is TO DO Everything he can.

“I hit three or four hours a day,” he said. “At one point, your body decomposes, but I prefer to break down that not to give the effort.”

Betts presented itself at the Dodger stadium before 1:30 p.m. Monday for the opening of the series against the Cardinals, which started at 7:10 am. He struck the stick cages, worked on his defense in the field and participated in hitting practices. He returned to the striking cages around 4:30 am and stayed there until 6:15 am.

“I’m just trying to relearn, go to the basics, relearn myself,” he said. “I had to go back and think about what I was doing in the minor leagues, [those] types of things.

Betts may not have yet understood the adjustments required to get out of his crisis, but he is not out of ideas either. He admitted that he was deliberately sounding more ignorant than he really is to avoid discussing the changes he tries to implement.

“There are a lot of things I work on,” he said. “This is what will not offer you, but you will not understand guys.”

The former right defender did not think that the workload at the Copped stop was behind his problems, and he did not think that his batpeed had decreased in the last two years, as indicated by the data of the baseball monitoring system.

“I didn’t hit the solid ball,” said Betts. “Naturally, you slow down because you try to hit the solid ball.”

While the Betts deployment experience as a head striker ended after only two weeks, manager Dave Roberts said he was determined to beat him near the top of the range.

“If it is not the confidence of a manager to a player,” said Roberts, “I don’t know what it is.”

Betts rewarded Roberts’ faith on Tuesday in a 12-6 victory against the cardinals on Tuesday because he had three for four with a double, a walk and three points. The three -stroke match was his first in almost two months.

Betts refused to read too much in performance.

“It’s good to get the results, but it’s a match,” he said. “Whenever we talk about [a good game]I’m going 0 for 20 after. So we will see tomorrow.

He left the uncertain stadium of the results the next day, but he knew what the process would be. He would continue to work and continue to look for answers.