Jackie Robinson Weekend Blue for Dodgers

Well at least the weather was good. The Dodgers, as well as Major League Baseball celebrated Jackie Robinson Day Saturday April 15th. The Blue Crew looked to improve their record against arch rival San Francisco Giants but found themselves falling short and wondering what happened. It was an eventful and dare we say, entertaining series if not a successful one. The Dodgers dropped 2 of 3 to the Giants and fell below .500 (6-7) with a sad 2-4 record at home. Jackie Robinson Day itself was a success as the Odalis Perez pitched seven strong innings to get a 3-1 victory over Giants ace Jason Schmidt in front of over 53,000 in attendance. The other two games however found the Dodgers searching for their hitting stroke as well as for answers. They managed only 4 runs in 3 games as opposed to the offensive explosion against the Pirates in their previous series which featured a 13 run game on Thursday. Also noted in the games was the absent bat of one Barry Bonds. The San Francisco slugger failed to hit his first homerun of the season against LA and that is something that LAist can take solace in.

However, last nights game saw the Dodgers main offensive threat, Jeff Kent, go down with a beaning in the 7th inning. He had to leave the game with a concussion and his status is still in doubt for upcoming games. They will try to right the ship against the visiting Chicago Cubs today, tomorrow and Wednesday (all night games).

LAist noted a few things during the ESPN telecast of Sunday's game. Most notably was a comment by noted baseball man and Hall of Famer Peter Gammons. He remarked that the percentage of African-American players in baseball has been in steady decline in recent years. He suggested that a better homage to the late, great Jackie Robinson would be for Major League Baseball to put money into programs that would bring African-American youths back to the game. A fair idea indeed. Now if he could figure out a solution for help bring the bats back to the Dodgers...