Although it has long been known, understood, and accepted that any baseball team can beat any other baseball team on any given day, there are some losses which, quite frankly, are unacceptable and inexcusable. Such was the case in Saturday’s ugly 4-3 loss by the NL West first-place Los Angeles Dodgers loss to the NL West last-place Colorado Rockies in front of an impressive Coors Field crowd of 47,925.

I say unacceptable and inexcusable because baseball’s hottest-hitting team managed only eight total hits (to the Rockies seven), while striking out eight times and drawing only two walks (to the Rockies seven and two respectively).

But of bigger concern were the eight Dodgers runners left on base while going 0-for-7 with runners in scoring position. Unacceptable and inexcusable.

“It was just a grind all night,” was the best that Dodgers manager Dave Roberts could come up with postgame, noting that 26-year-old starting right-hander Emmet Sheehan struggle during his 5.0 innings of work, during which he allowed two earned runs on four hits while striking out four and walking two.

“I gotta be better early in the game,” Sheehan admitted postgame to SportsNet LA’s Kirsten Watson.

But for as off as Sheehan was on Saturday, Dodgers right-handed reliever Will Klein was even more so. The 26-year-old Bloomington, IN native not only blew the Dodgers early 2-1 lead by surrendering two earned runs on two hits for his first blown save of the young season, he also suffered his first loss of the season to go with his one win.

With the Dodgers loss to the Rockies and wins by the second-place San Diego Padres, third place Arizona Diamondbacks, and fourth-place San Francisco Giants, the NL West shapes up like this:

Play Ball!

  *  *  *  *  *  *