2021 Dodgers season in thirds: The middle 54 games

Tuesday’s game was the 108th of the season for the Dodgers, which means we are two-thirds through the very long season.

Some might even say unfathomably long after not covering a team full-time for year and a half, followed by a pandemic-truncated 60-game sprint year, but that’s another story for another time.

What we have in 2021 is a Dodgers team that, despite some changes, have performed incredibly similar in the first third and second third of the season. They were 32-22 in the first 54 games, and 32-22 again in the second 54.

First up, let’s look at the catchers, which saw Will Smith start behind the plate a little more often in the second third of the season.

The first 54 games include three starts at designated hitter for Smith and one for Barnes. Behind the plate, the split was 34-20 for Barnes in the first third and 38-16 in the second third.

The Dodgers finished up all 10 games in American League ballparks in the first 54 games, leaving no DH starts for the rest of the year. Because of the many players who vacillate between the infield and outfield, I decided to group the position players all together as a group, denoting their starts in each general area.

Chris Taylor made nearly all his starts in the outfield in the first third of the year, and almost every start in the infield in the second third. He’s hit well in each third.

You can also see the improvement of Mookie Betts, Justin Turner, and AJ Pollock as the season wore on, as well as the struggles of Cody Bellinger and Gavin Lux.

Walker Buehler’s really been on one for a little over two months.

For pitchers, I didn’t count starts that were just the beginning of a bullpen game, but included a pair of planned bulk outings from Tony Gonsolin and Josiah Gray as starts despite them entering in relief. In the real starts, the Dodgers averaged about two-thirds of an inning less per start in the second 54 games than in the first 54.

Despite getting used more often, the many faces of the Dodgers bullpen improved in the second third of the season.

Through 108 games, the Dodgers are on pace for 96 wins. Let’s see how the final third of the season plays out.