For the primary time since June 10, 2022, Walker Buehler returns to the Dodgers to make his season debut in opposition to the Miami Marlins tonight.

It's been an extended street to restoration from a second Tommy John surgical procedure for Buehler, who expressed curiosity in returning on the finish of 2023 earlier than being shut down in September. There was a perception that he would possibly throw a number of innings in spring coaching, however that by no means occurred. After lacking all of spring coaching and making six rehab begins, Buehler will return to a rotation the place he isn't essentially relied on to be the true ace.

Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic writes in regards to the expectations for Buehler throughout the 2024 season, noting that he must use a good pitch combine as a substitute of bullying hitters along with his fastball.

“I feel it's all the time going to be Walker,” supervisor Dave Roberts mentioned this week. “He's going to assault. However I feel he's attacking along with his complete repertoire. I feel in years previous, it was heavy fastball, heavy cutter. The place I feel Walker has extra weapons. And I feel (utilizing them) is what it’s my hope, as a substitute of simply making an attempt to bully the blokes.

Hyperlinks

Contemporary off profitable the Nationwide League Participant of the Month award for April, Mookie Betts leads the best way for the Dodgers offense and leads all of baseball with 2.9 fWAR. He’s presently second in baseball in OPS, first in walks, second in hits, and tied for first in runs scored.

Invoice Plunkett of the Orange County Register writes about the opportunity of Betts ending the season main all of baseball in hits, runs scored, and walks.

Joel Reuter of Bleacher Stories lists the slowest begin of any crew to the season, noting that Chris Taylor's early season struggles name for panic.

His .143 batting common and 20.7 slugging share are among the many worst in baseball, and his strikeout charge has climbed to a career-high 38.1 p.c. Within the third season of a four-year, $60 million deal, he may need a tough time dwelling as much as his wage the remainder of the best way.

Shohei Ohtani seemingly makes historical past with each sport he performs, and the identical continued this weekend in opposition to the Atlanta Braves. After passing his supervisor for essentially the most dwelling runs by a Japanese-born participant in crew historical past, Ohtani added two extra dwelling runs to his season complete on Sunday, giving him 25 further base hits on the season.

Ohtani's 25 further base hits are essentially the most of any Dodger by means of his first 35 video games for the reason that 1901 season, tweets MLB.com's Sarah Langs



Source link