Inside the Dodgers outfield problem and how they

The Dodgers aren’t placing Mookie Betts back in proper discipline.

Or, at least, they aren’t actively contemplating it yet.

Manager Dave Roberts made that a lot clear this week, saying the membership has had no such discussions with the Gold Glove proper fielder-turned-success story at shortstop.

To this level, not even Teoscar Hernández’s defensive limitations or Michael Conforto’s offensive disappearing act have yet pushed the staff to that theoretical excessive.

“We have not talked about right field at all,” Roberts said this week, as the noise around Hernández’s shaky glove grew louder following a pair of misplays in a Monday loss at Colorado.

“The way Mookie is playing at short,” Roberts added, “not bouncing him around, I think we feel very good about.”

Still, as the Dodgers enter the last 34 video games of their schedule, beginning with a essential collection in San Diego against the second-place Padres this weekend, the membership’s outfield points stay a problem.

And while Betts won’t be the apparent answer this time — like he was last 12 months when he made a late-season swap to proper — the Dodgers will nonetheless have to discover some solutions.

Entering play Thursday, their two nook outfield positions mixed ranked just nineteenth among MLB golf equipment in whole wins above alternative, and twenty second in defensive ranking, according to Fangraphs.

“Defense is a big part of postseason baseball and winning baseball,” Roberts said.

Here are the choices the Dodgers could have to take into account over the coming month and a half:

The current forged

For now, the Dodgers don’t have a lot other alternative but to roll out the same couple lineup variations they have been sporting since the commerce deadline.

Most nights, that means having Hernández in proper discipline, where, despite a current uptick from his once slumping bat, the 32-year-old ranks in the backside half of MLB proper fielders in defensive runs saved (-1) and outs above average (-9); and Conforto in left, where the only factor worse than his lowly rated protection (-2 DRS, -5 OAA) has been a .186 batting average that is a distant last among MLB hitters with 350 plate appearances (next closest: Oneil Cruz’s .207 mark).

Ideally, the Dodgers would benefit from shifting Hernández to left discipline (where he also struggled while enjoying primarily last season, but made fewer of the obtrusive errors that have marred his last couple weeks) and relegating Conforto largely to the bench.

But, that requires another option they trust to take on more enjoying time some other place in the outfield.

And if it’s not Betts, then Alex Call represents the current roster’s only potential match.

Call arrived last month as one thing of an underwhelming deadline acquisition. Sure, he was having a good season with the Washington Nationals, and burnished his repute as a robust at-bat on opposing pitchers. But he wasn’t Steven Kwan, or Ramón Laureano, or Harrison Bader, or any of the more established big-league outfielders that have been commerce targets at the deadline.

So far, that’s been mirrored in the Dodgers’ usage of the 30-year-old hitter, beginning him just eight instances in three weeks.

Call did have a strong exhibiting in the Rockies collection, reaching base eight instances in 13 plate appearances, including a double and home run in a four-hit sport Tuesday. He is batting .281 since becoming a member of the Dodgers, and has flashed (largely) strong play in either nook outfield spot.

In time, maybe he might step into more of a major function. His versatile glove (he has also performed heart in the big leagues) and contact capability make him a potential floor-raiser for the lineup.

For now, however, given the staff’s short-handed, injury-plagued bench, Roberts has dedicated to successfully platooning Call in left discipline alongside Conforto — the $17-million offseason signing whom the Dodgers appear to be giving one last likelihood to stage some type of late-season turnaround.

The IL reinforcements

Dodgers utility participant Kiké Hernández watches from the dugout during a sport against the San Diego Padres on Aug. 15.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

Eventually, if Conforto continues to hunch and Call can’t command more enjoying time, the Dodgers could have to discover a better option.

On Thursday, two potential options suited up during rehab assignments with triple-A Oklahoma City.

In heart discipline was veteran October hero Kiké Hernández, who has been sidelined for months (and restricted bodily before that) with an elbow injury he first sustained in May.

In left discipline, surprisingly, was South Korean offseason signing Hyeseong Kim, a second base specialist who dabbled in heart discipline at the start of the season, before finally settling in the infield prior to a shoulder injury.

Both gamers might signify defensive outfield upgrades once they return. Kim’s experimentation in left discipline is especially intriguing, even though he suffered defensive lapses during his temporary stint in heart.

The real wild card in this equation, however, could possibly be another identify at the moment caught on the injured record.

An preferrred model of the Dodgers lineup figures to embrace utility man Tommy Edman in heart, Teoscar Hernández in left and Andy Pages in proper — permitting Betts to stick at shortstop; a mixture of Kim, Kiké Hernández, Miguel Rojas (and perhaps even Alex Freeland) to fill out second base; and Pages to transfer to proper discipline, where his cannon of an arm is most precious.

Edman, though, has been dogged by an ankle injury for a lot of the summer season and still seems a number of weeks from returning. Questions stay as to whether or not he can get to a place bodily where he might play outfield again this season.

“His versatility is a superpower,” Roberts said, in explaining why the staff is making an attempt to give Edman as a lot time to return as attainable. “So the ability to play the infield, kick out to the outfield, and not be compromised by the ankle and not regress, that’s something we need.”

The Mookie situation

Dodgers shortstop Mookie Betts throws out Milwaukee’s Caleb Durbin at first base on July 20.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

Though Roberts shut down discuss of transferring Betts back to the outfield, he was cautious not to slam the door shut solely when wanting over the relaxation of the season.

“I think that’s a fair question,” Roberts said. “But I don’t think that we’re there quite yet.”

It was around this time last 12 months, of course, that the Dodgers announced Betts would shift from shortstop back to proper discipline; returning him to a place where he has six profession Gold Gloves.

And for a lot of this season, large factions of the fan base have been ready for historical past to repeat itself, particularly amid hypothesis about how a lot Betts’ shortstop play has contributed to a career-worst season at the plate.

However…

This 12 months’s Dodgers staff just isn’t last 12 months’s Dodgers staff. And this 12 months’s model of Betts’ shortstop play has added a new issue into a delicate equation.

While Betts would nearly definitely stay a reliable option in proper discipline, his defensive metrics at that place the last couple of years have grown pedestrian in contrast to his once-generational requirements.

In his prime, Betts was often someplace between 15-30 in DRS and upward of 10-15 in OAA enjoying proper discipline. But in more than 1,000 proper discipline innings the last three years, he has only posted a plus-3 DRS and a net-zero OAA. His vary just isn’t what it used to be (Betts ranks in just the thirty fifth percentile among major-leaguers in dash velocity, per Baseball Savant). And he has remade his throwing movement to better swimsuit the calls for of shortstop.

As Betts confirmed while enjoying proper discipline last postseason, he can still make an affect there.

But as he has shown this 12 months, he might be precious at other spots on the diamond, too.

After struggling at shortstop last season, Betts now ranks third in the majors at the place in DRS (plus-11) and ninth in OAA (plus-3). Sure, Rojas or Edman might most likely present comparable (and in Rojas’ case, perhaps improved) shortstop protection. But Rojas, 36, has struggled to maintain up bodily amid common enjoying time the last couple years. And if Edman’s ankle isn’t good enough to deal with heart, it’s truthful to surprise how restricted he can be at a key place like shortstop.

It’s why, for now, the Dodgers are attempting to merely tread water with their current outfield group, while ready for a better repair (either in Call or Edman or Kiké or Kim or, if they must, perhaps even Betts) to grow to be clear.

What they do know: They need to be better in the corners, on both sides of the ball.

That was apparent before the commerce deadline. It stays a problem now. And until they discover a answer, it would loom as one potential stumbling block to their pursuit of a second straight World Series.