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Playoff baseball is stressful enough without feeling like you’re letting your team and an entire fan base down with every empty at-bat, which is why Dodgers manager Dave Roberts pulled right fielder Mookie Betts aside for a little chat during Monday’s off-day workout in Petco Park.
Betts struck out, grounded out and walked three times — two of them intentional — in Saturday night’s National League Division Series-opening 7-5 win over the San Diego Padres in Dodger Stadium, and he was hitless with a strikeout in four at-bats in Sunday night’s 10-2 Game 2 loss.
The veteran right fielder who starred on both sides of the ball during the team’s run to the 2020 World Series title. is now three for 44 (.068) in his last 12 playoff games dating to Game 4 of the 2021 NL Championship Series, including an 0-for-11 collar in last season’s three-game NLDS sweep at the hands of the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Roberts thought Betts, who turned 32 on Monday, had good at-bats in Game 1, but he could sense Betts gripping the bat a little tighter in Game 2.
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“I don’t know if it’s angst or the pressure of past performances starting to kind of bleed in, but that’s something I don’t want to happen,” Roberts said. “I believe he’s going to come to life. I know he has the talent. Obviously, he’s not afraid of the situation.
“So for me, it’s more of just go out there and compete your tail off. It’s up to all of us to make sure that he’s in a good head space to go out there and compete and not get too worried about each particular at-bat.”
Roberts wanted to remind Betts on the eve of Tuesday night’s Game 3 in Petco Park to keep his eyes on the road ahead and stop staring in the rearview mirror.
“The fact is you can’t change the last X amount of postseason games,” Roberts said. “I understand the burden a player might have, but all anyone is concerned about is right now and how to best prepare yourself mentally for [Tuesday] night and the first at-bat. So that’s going to be basically my message.
“When you look at [great] postseason performers, it’s not that they over-performed their career stat line from the regular season. What they’ve done [in the playoffs] is what they’ve done in the regular season. But on that stage they’re considered [great] postseason players. So in this particular case, all we expect is for Mookie to be the same player he is in the regular season. And that’s it.”
Betts, who spoke with mental skills coach Brent Walker for several minutes on the field during Monday night’s workout, took no consolation in the fact that he was robbed of a home run when Padres outfielder Jurickson Profar leaped above the short left-field wall and into the crowd to catch his first-inning fly ball Sunday night.
“It’s an out,” Betts said. “It doesn’t matter if it’s a groundout, flyout, strikeout, it’s an out. It’s all the same.”
Betts, an eight-time All-Star and the 2018 American League most valuable player with the Boston Red Sox, said he took 300-400 swings in the batting cage on Monday, “and I still have more to do,” he said. “It is what it is.”
Has Betts reached a point where he has to turn his brain off and let his instincts and ability take over?
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“No,” he said. “If I turn my brain off, it’s going to get worse. I have to keep trying.”
Roberts acknowledged that the narrative about Betts’ postgame struggles may be weighing on the player.
“Yeah, I think so, but that’s natural,” Roberts said. “Certainly, there’s been a lot of talk about it. He’s mentioned it himself. For me, it’s two games and [six] official at-bats. I don’t want him to get caught up in that. It’s important for him to just be himself.”
Betts said it is nearly “impossible” to not let past postseasons bleed into this one, “especially when, and you guys are doing your job, but you’re asking about it, so there’s no way to get away from it,” he said.
“The world knows. It’s not like it’s a secret. I know. Nobody is telling me anything I don’t know already. Nobody can be harder on me than myself. The only thing I can really do is look forward. I know it’s there. … I’m trying, man. That’s all I can say.”
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Betts spent 4 ½ seasons as the Dodgers’ leadoff hitter before suffering a left-hand fracture when he was hit by a pitch in mid-June. Shohei Ohtani moved to the leadoff spot in Betts’ absence and hit so well that he remained there when Betts returned in early August, Betts moving to the second spot.
But Roberts said that as of Monday, he hadn’t given any thought to moving Betts back to the leadoff spot, where Betts might be more comfortable and get more fastballs to hit with Ohtani batting behind him.
“I just don’t think hitting first or second at this point is going to change much,” Roberts said. “I think Shohei is in a really good spot. We scored a lot of runs this year. And I just don’t think that after two or three games, [the situation] calls for that.”
Who’s on first?
First baseman Freddie Freeman, who was pulled from Sunday night’s game in the sixth inning because of right-ankle discomfort, received treatment on Monday and did not practice with the team on the field Monday night.
Roberts said he expects the left-handed-hitting Freeman, who had two hits and stole a base on his severely sprained ankle in Game 1, to play in Game 3 on Tuesday night, but he might rest Freeman in Game 4 if the Padres start left-hander Martin Perez.
Roberts said he has given no thought to taking Freeman off the NLDS roster, a move that would prevent Freeman from playing in the NL Championship Series if the Dodgers advance.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
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