Cingrani Battles Capuano, As Dodgers Look To Stay Hot, Hot, Hot

Dodgers Lineup vs. Cincinnati

Tony Cingrani-4-1 vs. Chris Capuano-3-6

So we now know I have a poor sense of direction. I think I’ll live, but boy do I have issues with parking lots. Sometimes I’m up in the press box, but sometimes I sit in the stands. Last night I was in the stands and had some serious issues finding my car. (I had stupidly left my ticket in my car) Perhaps if I had one of the countless cars that Howard Cole offers for home runs on twitter then maybe I could have used that to drive around the Dodger Stadium parking lot. Regardless of my pre-game flustering, I soldiered on.

But you know who doesn’t have any issues with anything right now? The Dodgers! The Boys in Blue are hot hot hot! Oh, see Dodgers playing, see Dodgers winning, they stay hot, hot hot. See Dodgers hitting, see Dodgers pitching, they so hot hot hot. (Photo credit-Peter Serling) Last night’s 4-1 victory in front of a sold out raucous crowd put them 1.5 games in front of the losing Dbacks.

The Dodgers are now 55-48 on the season and have won 25 of their last 31 games. Today the Dodgers look to pick up a series win over the Reds. For that they’ll give the ball to Chris Capuano. He’ll battle another left hander, rookie Tony Cingrani, in the final game of the series.

Los Angeles Dodgers starting pitcher Chris Capuano (35) reacts during the game against the Colorado Rockies at Dodger Stadium.-Richard Mackson-USA TODAY Sports

Rookie left hander Tony Cingrani has made 16 starts this season. The 24 year old left hander is from Evergreen Illinois, and was drafted by the Reds in 2011. Cingrani has posted a 4-1 record, and a 3.18 ERA. In a little over 70 frames, he’s whiffed 79 and walked 29. Cingrani was orginally called up to replace the injured Johnny Cueto. Cingrani’s last start was a win. He pitched 5.2 frames of two-run ball to beat the Giants.

The youngster had some issues with velocity and control of hiss off-speed pitches, or so I read. Apparently he can get up to mid 90’s with his heater. Cingrani of course has never faced the Dodgers before, and nobody has seen him. That doesn’t bode well for the Dodgers, because we know how they do against pitchers they’ve never seen before. That’s about all I know about Cingrani, which isn’t much.

But I do know, Chris Capuano. He’ll be countering Cingrani for the boys in blue. Capauno’s last start against Toronto saw him get torched pretty good. He allowed five runs on seven hits in 4.1 frames. Thank goodness the Dodgers won anyways. Before you start telling me how much Capuano sucks, remember his start before that he tossed six scoreless innings against Colorado while whiffing eight. At times Capuano can be effective, and let’s just hope that this afternoon is one of those times.

Don’t point at me Tony.

Capuano has faced the Reds in 16 games, and has posted a 3-3 record, and a 4.92 ERA. Capuano has allowed 101 hits in a little over 86 innings against the Reds. Despite Capuano having a down year, he is still able to strike guys out at a decent rate. Cappy has whiffed 50 and walked only 16 in 62 frames. He has a 3-6 record and an ERA of 5.03. The Cincy numbers versus Capuano are pretty scary. The Reds as a team are batting .303 (30 for 99) against Capuano. Votto and Phillips are both hitting over .400 versus Cappy. Check out how the rest of the Red legs are doing against Capuano.

PA

AB

H

2B

3B

HR

RBI

BB

SO

BA

OBP

SLG

OPS

32

32

14

4

0

1

4

0

4

.438

.438

.656

1.094

16

15

6

1

0

1

2

1

4

.400

.438

.667

1.104

13

10

3

0

0

2

5

3

3

.300

.462

.900

1.362

12

12

3

1

0

0

0

0

2

.250

.250

.333

.583

9

7

1

1

0

0

0

2

3

.143

.333

.286

.619

8

8

0

0

0

0

0

0

4

.000

.000

.000

.000

6

5

2

0

0

0

1

0

3

.400

.400

.400

.800

3

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

1

.000

.000

.000

.000

3

2

0

0

0

0

0

1

0

.000

.333

.000

.333

2

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

.000

.000

.000

.000

2

2

1

0

0

0

1

0

0

.500

.500

.500

1.000

2

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

2

.000

.000

.000

.000

Total

108

99

30

7

0

4

13

7

26

.303

.349

.495

.844

A few side notes before we sign off until game time.

Tony CIngrani hasn’t allowed more than three runs in a start since May 4. The Dodger offense has outscored opponents 55-29 since the all-star break.

Carl Crawford started feeling ill on Friday night, acceding to reports. He had three hits on Friday, and has a seven game hitting streak. In that span Crawford is 14 for 33 (.424), with three doubles. Don Mattingly said that he hoped to have Crawford back for Sunday’s tilt, but it doesn’t look likely. Apparently Crawford had a pretty high fever. It was high enough to put him on antibiotics. Don Mattingly had noticed Crawford looking haggard, and decided it best to rest him after sending him to the doctor to get checked out. The Dodger called it precautionary, and it appears it’s nothing more than the flu.

Howard Cole has yet to offer a car to Skip Schumaker. That may change with the way the utility guy is hitting.

The Dodgers are now 17-5 in July. The only other Dodger team to have a higher winning percentage in the month of July was the pennant winning club of 1977. That team went 17-3 which comes out to an .850 winning percentage.

I will be on the Yanks Go Yard Podcast tonight after the game at 7:30 PM pacific time. We’ll be discussing many things, including the upcoming Yankees/Dodgers series. You can listen to the show here.

You can catch the game today at 1:10 PM on Prime Ticket. We’ll have the recap for you at the usual time, so don’t forget to join us over here after the game. Unless I forget where I parked my car again, then who knows right? I am kidding of course. Stacie covers tonight, so nobody has to worry about that. Go Blue!