Dodgers offense looking for a middle ground

This has been a bizarre and often baffling year on offense for the Dodgers, who are at or near the top in several categories but seem to have adopted a feast-or-famine persona of late.

The Dodgers erupted for 10 runs on four home runs on Sunday to get the Giants out of their system for a few months, then hit two more home runs on Monday at Wrigley Field, but failed to keep another runner in scoring position against the Cubs long enough to last at least one plate appearance.

The Dodgers lead the National League in OPS (.773), OPS+ (115), wOBA (.337), wRC+ (116), on-base percentage (.334), slugging percentage (.439), home runs (93) and walks (253), and rank second in doubles (124). Taking the long view, that's pretty good, but sometimes it's hard to appreciate the forest when all you can see lately are a bunch of rotted-out trees.

At 4.28 runs per game, the Dodgers rank fourth in the NL, but they rarely score exactly four or exactly five runs in a game. They are 2-2 when scoring four runs, and 3-1 when scoring five runs, but those account for only 11.3 percent of the club's games.

They have played more games at the extremes.

The Dodgers are 25-1 (.962) when scoring six or more runs, and have done so in 36.6 percent of their games. MLB teams on average have scored six or more runs 27.9 percent of the time, and have an .878 winning percentage when doing so.

When scoring zero to three runs, the Dodgers are 9-28 (.243), slightly better than the MLB winning percentage of .222 in those contests. But the Dodgers have played over half their games scoring three or fewer runs (52.1 percent), again more than the MLB average (47.6 percent).

The Dodgers rank first in the NL in most games scoring six or more runs, and rank fourth in most games scoring three or fewer. They are dead last in games scoring four or five runs.

The MLB as a whole as scored four or five runs 24.5 percent of the time. The Dodgers have done so 11.3 percent of the time.

The Dodgers have scored three or fewer runs in 24 of their last 36 games, so that is most fresh in our minds.

Game info

Time: 5:05 p.m. PT

TV: SportsNet LA