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When last night's shutout of the Dodgers in Arizona at Chase Field is paired with the blanking Los Angeles received at the hands of Rockies pitching in Coors Field on August 27 (Josh Beckett's Dodgers debut sixteen days ago), one finds that the current Dodgers offense has been shut out in both hitter paradises in the same season for only the second time ever.
The only other LA team to sink to such a low before was the highly offensively challenged 2003 Dodgers who batted a collective .243 / .303 / .368, 79 OPS+ that year, becoming one of the worst Dodger offenses in recent memory. (Heck, even the 1968 Dodgers had a 90 OPS+.) Those lineups featured a damaged labrum (Shawn Green), a struggling Adrian (Adrian Beltre), and a rapidly declining import (Fred McGriff); drawing parallels to the current squad is left as an exercise to the reader. This is the depths to which the run-scoring futility has sunk for the Dodger bats.
In fact, that 2003 team was shut out at Chase Field twice that season, on July 26 and September 11, while the Colorado goose eggs were laid on May 28. The skillful starters for those games? Shawn Chacon threw eight zeroes for the Rockies. Elmer Dessens went seven scoreless for the first Arizona whitewash, while that accomplishment was later matched by none other than Chris Capuano.
The Dodgers will try not to match the 2003 exactly by scoring some runs in Phoenix tonight.
Game Time: 6:40 p.m.
TV: Prime Ticket