When you enter the All-Star break with the best overall record in Major League Baseball (60-32), and you have an MLB-best 13.5-game lead over the second-best team in your division, it’s difficult to say, in good conscience, that you are entering the break on a down note. But the cold, hard truth is that no matter how Dodgers manager Dave Roberts tries to spin it, you are.

“We’ll be ready for the Red Sox. No gathering or message to the team to rally the troops. We know what to do,” Roberts spun it to the media after his team lost three of four to the NL West third-place San Diego Padres this weekend … at home.

But spin it as he may, the team that was once predicted to run away with their seventh consecutive division title with 104 wins (or more) has clearly shown that they are not the Goliath team that Roberts and his players like to think they are.

Following Sundays depressing 5-3 third-straight loss to the perennial NL West cellar dwellers, 20-year-old San Pedro de Macoris, Dominican Republic native Fernando Tatis Jr. sent a very clear message to the Dodgers – and to all of baseball – after his remarkable 5-for-15 (.333) series against the Dodgers that included two home runs on Sunday; the first off of Dodgers right-handed starter Ross Stripling and the second off of right-hander Pedro Baez that was the eventual game-winner.

“We showed what we were capable of, how we’re moving, what we can do,” said Tatis. “So pay attention. It’s going to be interesting.”

Oh sure, it’s easy to blow this off as little more than hype from a 20-year-old kid. But that 20-year-old kid became the youngest player in history to go yard twice in a game at Dodger Stadium and the youngest player in Padres history to record a multi-home run game, surpassing the previous mark set by Cesar Crespo, who had done so as a 22-year-old in 2001.

“Tatis showed how good he is and what competing against him for the next six years is going to look like,” Stripling said, after suffering his third loss of the season (with three wins) and bumping his ERA up to 3.79. Stripling allowed four runs on six hits (including two home runs), while walking none and striking out three in his 4.1 innings of work on Sunday.

But what concerns Dodgers fans the most – or at least should – is that the best team in baseball went a collective 25-for-128 (.195) and were 4-for-20 (.200) with runners in scoring position, while slugging only four home runs over the four-game series with the friars. They also left a total of 23 runners on base.

Spin it as you will, that sounds like a down note to me.

The good news – great, actually – is that Dodgers two-time All-Star, two-time Silver Slugger, and 2016 National League Rookie of the Year Corey Seager is expected to rejoin the team to kickoff the second half against the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park on Friday, July 12.

As Dodger fans know, the 25-year-old Dodgers shortstop was just beginning to get (red) hot when he landed on the 10-day injured list for a strained left hamstring suffered on June 11 against the Angels of Anaheim at Angels Stadium. Seager has been rehabbing with the Dodgers Advanced Single-A Rancho Cucamonga Quakes this past weekend and is 2-for-4 (both singles) with a RBI. Prior to the injury, Seager was in the midst of a nine-game hitting streak in which he was slashing .459 / .487 / .730.

On Saturday, Roberts told ThinkBlueLA that he expects Seager to be ready to go immediately following the break will play in all three games in Boston and all four games in Philadelphia without any restrictions or innings limits.

Great news indeed … and not a moment too soon.

Play Ball!

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