Dodgers News: Roberts Sticking With Cody Bellinger at Bottom of Lineup

The struggling outfielder and former MVP still has support from his manager in LA.

Dodgers outfielder Cody Bellinger has struggled immensely this season, continuing a downward trend since his MVP season in 2019.

Bellinger started slow in 2020, holding a .489 OPS one-third of the way into the shortened season. But he hit .284 with a .960 OPS over his final 37 games to finish with a respectable 112 OPS+.

Last year, he missed much of the season with a variety of injuries, not to mention the offseason shoulder surgery he had due to a dislocated right shoulder suffered in the 2020 NLCS. So his 44 OPS+, while disappointing, was easy to chalk up to injuries.

This year, though, Bellinger has been healthy, and he has shown signs of being very good. But overall, his 77 OPS+ is his worst in a non-injury season, and it's a testament to his defense that he has still managed to post a 1.3 WAR overall. Of course, the rule of thumb for WAR is that 2.0 is "good enough to be a starter," so while Bellinger's 1.3 is better than expected, it's still not good.

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts, though, is determined to give Bellinger every chance to get right, knowing the Dodgers are a better team in October with a good, productive Bellinger than without. As J.P. Hoornstra writes in the Orange County Register, Roberts was cautiously encouraged by Bellinger's plate discipline in Sunday's game, when the go-ahead run actually scored on a bases-loaded Belli walk.

“Tonight the plate discipline was really good,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “Earning three walks was great. I think the next layer is, when you do get pitches in the zone, you’ve got to finish the at-bat. That’s something we’re going to keep working on, because he did get some pitches he should hit.”

Over the weekend, Dodgers analyst Jerry Hairston Jr. had some strong words about Bellinger's approach, and it's clear that everyone is trying to figure out how to get Belli back, if not to his 2019 MVP form, at least to being a productive member of the offense.

“You see a ball and you’re expecting (Bellinger) to square it up,” Roberts said. “It could be a mechanical thing, it could be a mind thing, could be a body thing. … It’s a combination of things."

Sunday was Bellinger's first three-walk game of the season and his first multi-walk game since May, so it's unclear whether it was a fluke or the result of a conscious focus on plate discipline. With the firepower at the top of the Dodgers lineup, a nine-hole hitter who can work a walk to turn the lineup over could be valuable.

As of right now, until and unless Bellinger gets his swing figured out, it seems like that plate discipline is what the Dodgers are banking on in sticking with Belli at the bottom of the lineup.