Why Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman have struggled at the plate

Denver – While the Dodgers finished the Colorado rockies on Thursday, two of their Cornerstone strikers helped open the way.

In what was a score equally at the head of the sixth round, Mookie Betts started with a double in the gap, Freddie Freeman brought him home with an online route on the right, and the Dodgers took an advance which they did not give up, finishing a scan of three games which kept them equally for the best record of baseball.

For many of the past four years, it would have been a common sequence. Shohei Ohtani could be the most powerful striker in Dodgers programming, but Betts and Freeman have long been the foundation of their attack; All-Stars of each season they played in Los Angeles and the MVP candidates most often.

Thursday, however, their sixth round heroism had a different feeling. Because, in the past three weeks, the two superstars have been mired in surprisingly austere collapses.

In the last 17 games of Betts, the former MVP beats.

The last 20 Freeman games have been even worse, highlighted by an average of 0.160 which marks the lowest season of 20 games in his career – reducing the stellar figures he had this year beforehand.

These coin struggles have not triggered “long -term concerns,” said manager Dave Roberts this week. Thursday’s match provided long -awaited production, a sigh of relief for two veteran sluggers who do not often need it.

But still, the numbers are the numbers. A trip to Coors Field even to the strikers failed to bring them fully back to life. And until they bounce back, the questions external on their bats will persist, while their personal research will continue.

“I have been frustrated for about six weeks now,” said Freeman recently.

“If I knew [what was wrong]”Betts echoes this week,” I promise you that I would not continue to do so. “”

The Mookie Betts of Dodgers remains categorical that playing the Second stop is not the reason why its figures are broken this season.

(Luke Johnson / Los Angeles Times)

Not long ago, Betts and Freeman were on opposite polar trajectories, which increases most of May and early June on offensive radiators that evaporated their slow (and physically hampered) begins in the countryside.

On April 28, Betts struck only 0.230 with an OPS almost below 0.700, clearly affected by a stomach virus which drained it during the two weeks preceding the opening day.

Then, in a section of 32 games from April 29 to June 7, its typical production levels suddenly reappeared. He struck .312 with four doubles, four circuits and a .835 ops. And he did everything while showing the defensive mastery of the COURT stop, soothing an increasing story that the assessment of his new position limited his capacities to the plate.

“This is not the COURT stop,” said Betts last month. “Because remember, last year, I played quite well [offensively while] Play at the stop stop. I didn’t know what I was doing. Now I am much more confident in the way I introduce myself and prepare every day. The arrest argument cannot be the case. »»

Given his recent slippage, however, such speculation is back.

“I’m going to keep it up,” said Roberts when he asked him again about the dynamics this week. “I think it’s a fair debate. But all I can go is what Mookie says, with regard to the separation of the defense strike, the level of comfort with the defense … so I don’t think there is a correlation.”

Instead, Roberts underlined a lack of power as a more important factor. The percentage of Betts .392 slugging so far is 50 worse points than its previous career-basis (which has come in its 2014 recruit season). It ranks below the league average in underlying measures such as output speed, hard percentage and especially bat speed (moving to the 11th centile among MLB strikers in this category).

“I think it’s the lack of hitting the ball on the cannon,” said Roberts. “He’s a guy who knows how to find the barrel. But there are times when he pursues a little more than usual. And then there are many more pop-ups than typical. So, to get power, you have to find a barrel. This is what we are trying to do.”

Freeman has endured even more cervical boost in the middle of his ray mountain season.

At the end of May, he led the National League with an average of the stick of .374. He apparently compensated for the persistent pain that remained in the right ankle which he had surgically repaired during the offseason, then re-agraged with a shift in the shower at the end of March.

Even at 35, he appeared prepared for a potential career season, of course the right track for an elusive first title.

“It was relentless,” said Roberts last month.

Now, however, one of the best collectors in the game does not seem to buy a blow most of the time. His average stick fell 0.309 between Friday. Before his single Thursday afternoon, he had 0 for 11 in the Rockies series and one for Histier-22 in total.

“I saw signs where he struck the balls harshly and did nothing so that it could show,” said Roberts, looking for positive points in the midst of a very unusual crisis by Freeman. “It’s discouraging for him. But I just know that he will find his way.”

At this stage, however, he does not have, with his usual routine of exercises collapsing – a net exercise designed to promote a bat path inside, with mental clues intended to help him stay in his swing – having not yet made his mechanics read.

“I have started each signal again 16 times in the past six weeks,” he said. “So wait for him to click.”

Although Freeman, who has also struggled against a minor injury on quadriceps in recent weeks, always seems hindered while running the foundations and playing defense sometimes, he insisted that problems are not linked to injuries.

“The only pain is swing,” he said.

And despite his best efforts to hide such frustrations during the matches, Roberts noticed the results of his collapse.

“I think he just wants the consistency of his swing,” said Roberts. “Wants to feel good regularly.”

A little surprising, the dodgers did not miss a beat even with their apparently detected superstar pairing. The team has a 13-4 file in its last 17 games. The offensive scored six points per game during this period, a half-manche better than its average of MLB. Other bats in the middle of the Order – of the current chief of the NL Will Smith’s striker, to the candidate of the player in June Max Muncy and the second year star Andy second year – helped take over.

Ohtani, meanwhile, leads the national league with 28 circuits even by returning to two -way tasks.

But in the long term, a large part of the success of the Dodgers is still to travel Betts and Freeman. They are always the two most veterans and experienced producers in a range full of stars caliber talents.

At the very least, Roberts insisted, offered on Thursday “something to rely”.

But with the way in which last month disappeared for everyone, there is still a lot of work to do.