There are three guarantees in life:

1. Death,
2. Taxes,
3. Chris Taylor striking out.

…or Austin Barnes, or Matt Kemp, or Max Muncy, or even Yasiel Puig; and to a lesser extent Cody Bellinger, Joc Pederson and Yasmani Grandal.

Taylor, last season’s superhero, has struck out 142 times thus far this season – most in the National League by a very wide margin.

Barnes is now officially at the Mendoza Line with his .200 batting average and considered by many to be the team’s designated out.

Kemp, who many had pegged to be the 2018 National League MVP, has seen his batting average drop from a season high .355 on April 11 to a current .280. The extremely popular current former Dodger and 2018 All-Star is also 3-for-his-last-54 (.056).

Muncy, whose pre-All-Star break 22 home runs had him at a torrid Babe Ruth-like one home run for every 10 at-bats, has hit a grand total of four since.

At one point prior to the All-Star break, Muncy hit a home run in four consecutive games. He has hit a grand total of four since the break. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

In fact, the only Dodger who is not slumping horribly right now is third baseman Justin Turner, with honorable mention to newcomers Manny Machado and Brian Dozier.

Turner went 3-for-4 on Tuesday night with three doubles to tie a Dodgers record for most doubles in a game.
(Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

The point here is that while all of the attention is focused on the Dodgers struggling Kenley Jansen-less bullpen which is directly responsible for four of the Dodgers five consecutive losses, the real culprit is a Dodgers offense that has scored only 12 runs in those five losses (45 innings), while collecting a total of 36 hits and slugging only three home runs (Muncy, Puig, and Turner).

There is no denying that the Dodgers bullpen is an absolute train wreck of late, especially in the final at-bats by the opposing team. But the brutally painful truth is that in today’s game, you must – absolutely must – score more than two, three, or even four runs to win a major league baseball game. Over those last five games, the Dodgers offense has scored four, two, three, two, and one run respectively, and that is simply not getting it done.

Dodgers left-hander Scott Alexander had what was unquestionably the worst game of his four-year major league career on Monday night when he allowed four runs on four hits with a hit batsman in his 0.2 innings of work. He was one strike away from saving the game for Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw twice. Instead, he blew the save and suffered the eventual 5-2 Dodgers loss. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

The bad news is that with Tuesday’s ninth-inning loss (again), this time at the hands of starter-turned-reliever Kenta Maeda, the Dodgers are now in sole possession of third place in the NL West, one game back of the second place Colorado Rockies and two games back of the division-leading Arizona Diamondbacks.

The good news is that following Tuesday night’s 2-1 loss to the Hated Ones, the Dodgers are only two games back of the division-leading Arizona Diamondbacks. They are also now exactly three-fourths of the way through the 2018 season with 41 games remaining, so they’ve got that going for them.

Now, if the Dodgers can only find what goes here.
(Getty Images)

Play Ball!