By 9:00 pm (PT) tonight, the Dodgers will either be in first place in the NL West or they will not. They will have either finally snapped out of their brutal one-through-eight offense slump (Justin Turner notwithstanding) or they will once again become nightly scoreboard watchers hoping that Bruce Bochy’s far more fundamentally sound Giants lost – a situation that is far less likely to happen than more likely to.

Over the past four days, Dodgers manager Don Mattingly (and pretty much all of his players) has been asked ad nauseam about why his team seems to struggle more against the Giants than any other team; to which Mattingly (and pretty much all of his players) has repeatedly answered ad nauseam that they don’t; that playing the Giants is no different than playing any other team; that every day is a new day that starts fresh; that the Giants do not have his team’s number – yada… yada… yada.

But while Mattingly and his players and coaches may be getting tired of hearing the question ad nauseam, the bottom line is that burying their heads in the sand and pretending that it isn’t true is even more ad nauseam than the question and even more so their answers.

Mattingly may be getting tired of the “struggles against the Giants” question, but at some point he’s going to have to acknowledge that it’s true and come up with a solution. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

No one can or will argue that baseball, especially at its highest level, is all about confidence – both individually and as a team. But it’s also about selflessness. It’s about stepping into the batters box with runners in scoring position and instead of trying to be the hero by trying to hit the ball into the next county, shortening up their swing and trying to drop a single over the infielder’s head or slapping a single the opposite way.

Oh sure, we all love seeing those majestic Joc Pederson or Yasiel Puig or Adrian Gonzalez monster home runs, but trying to hit a home run over the pavilion roof is far less helpful to your team than a base hit (or even a walk) when down by multiple runs late in games. This is when base runners are needed, not solo shots. It is also an area of weakness for the Dodgers and an area of strength for the Giants.

Justin Turner is the only Dodger who seems to be hitting with any regularity – just as he did all of last season too. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

But just as the questions and answers of the ‘struggling against the Giants more than any other team’ are ad nauseam, so, too, are that endless and often vicious attacks against Mattingly over the various social media networks. Now this certainly isn’t to say that Mattingly doesn’t make bonehead decisions, he absolutely does (I’m still angry that he didn’t use Scott Van Slyke over Michael Young in the 2013 NLDS and NLCS), but it’s not Mattingly between the lines swinging the bat, pitching the ball or making the plays on the field, it’s the players themselves. They are the ones accountable for their play, not Don Mattingly. Yes, Mattingly decides who plays and who sits, and who comes out of the bullpen and who does not, but at baseball’s highest level, the players must play as flawlessly as is humanly possible. If they do not and they are not replaced by players who can and will, then it’s Andrew Friedman and Farhan Zaidi who must shoulder the blame, not Don Mattingly.

It would be ignorant to say that Jimmy Rollins and A.J. Ellis aren’t valuable to the Dodgers defensively and veteran leadership wise, but it is equally ignorant to… well… ignore the fact that they are both huge liabilities to the team offensively. And while Friedman and Zaidi continue to insist (ad nauseam) that Corey Seager and Hector Olivera are not yet MLB-ready, how do we know that they are not? Or what if, in fact, they are but are not given the opportunity to prove it one way or the other? If offense is your problem – as it clearly is for the Dodgers right now – what have you got to lose by bringing both of them up right now? They certainly can’t be any worse offensively than Jimmy Rollins or A.J. Ellis. And even if they are, you can always send them back down to the minors. And who knows, perhaps one or both of them will bring the same kind of spark to the team that Manny Ramirez and Yasiel Puig did when they joined the team mid-season.

But alas, don’t expect to see Corey Seager or Hector Olivera at Dodger Stadium anytime soon. Instead, expect to see Jimmy Rolling and A.J. Ellis continue falling farther below the Mendoza line and expect to see even more runners left stranded on base as Pederson, Puig (and several others) continue to trying to hit home runs when base hits will accomplish the same thing… and more.

This is it, Dodgers. Either you will be in first place in the NL West after tonight’s game or you will not. This one is on you, not the fans or the media, but you.