Los Angeles Dodgers (42-51) AT Arizona Diamondbacks (49-44)
July 16, 2011 at 8:10 PM EST
Opening Line:  ARI -133, LAD +113
Current Line:  ARI -135, LAD +114
Opening Total: 8
Current Total:  8

SP:  LAD- Hiroshi Kuroda; ARI- Ian Kennedy

As mentioned last night, the Dodgers have a lot of reasons to be pleased for a team that is so far below .500.  They won last night by a count of 6-4 and have now won five straight and will be looking ot hand the Diamondbacks their fourth straight loss tonight.

Dodgers players are trying to look past the off-field issues of the bankruptcy of the team and such, and focus on what actually matters:  winning.  Matt Kemp, in particular, is enjoying being on the right side of games for once:

“It feels good,” Kemp gloated. “We closed out the first half strong, winning four games in a row, and to come back and get another win, we’ve just got to keep going.”

Kemp has every reason to expect his success to continue, after having hit a two run homer and having driven in four runs last night.  In his 34 games at Arizona’s Chase Field, he has hit .313 with 6 HRs.  On the season, Kemp is batting .315 and he already has accumulated 71 RBIs.  Last night’s homer was the first in a while for Kemp, but he seems – like many baseball players – to be a player given to streaks, so to expect another shot from him tonight would not be out of the question at all.

Clayton Kershaw gave up four runs last night, but all four were unearned and given the fact that the Dodgers finally produced something offensively (6 runs no less), it proved to be enough.

Sending Kuroda to the mound tonight should produce similar results.  Kuroda is 6-10 with a 3.06 ERA.  Kuroda has a good bag of tricks from which to pull his pitches and is less reliant on his fastball than he has been in the past.  Last season, he ranked ninth in the majors in percent swinging strike rate, though he doesn’t strike out an unusual amount of batters given the amount of innings he pitches.  It is his ability to keep hitters off guard that makes him successful, not by a means of overpowering pitches.

In his last seven starts, Kuroda has gone 1-5 despite an outstanding 2.32 ERA.  It’s just that the Dodgers shoddy offense has only provided him with an average of 2.53 runs of support.  His last outing, still, was not very good, as he gave up 4 runs and 8 hits in 6 innings of a 5-3 loss to the New York Mets.  In his six career starts in Arizona, he has produced a 1-3 record with a 6.08 ERA, which isn’t exactly reason for optimism for Dodgers fans and players, but Kuroda’s ERA has been under 4.00 for the last three seasons and will be again this year, so perhaps the performances at Chase Field are a mere anomaly.

The Diamondbacks will send Ian Kennedy to the mound.  Kennedy is 9-3 on the season with a 3.44 ERA.  In his last outing, he gave up 3 runs in 6 innings, as the Diamondbacks went on to defeat the Saint Louis Cardinals 7-6.  The victory, his ninth, matched his total from all of last season when he went 9-10 despite a decent ERA of 3.80.

“I needed to find something just to grind through it (his last outing),” Kennedy remarked. “(It) was one of those games where you don’t feel very well but you have to get through it.”

Some betting trends:

The Los Angeles Dodgers are 5-0 SU in their last 5 games and the total has gone UNDER in 4 of the last 5 games.  The total has gone OVER, however, in 8 of the last 11 on the road, while the Dodgers are 2-4 SU in their last 6 on the road.  The Dodgers are 14-6 SU in their last 20 against the Arizona Diamondbacks and the total has gone UNDER in 4 of the last 6 against the Diamondbacks, as well.  The Dodgers are 10-4 SU in their last 14 road games against the Diamondbacks.

The Arizona Diamondbacks are 2-4 SU in their last 6 games and the total has gone OVER In 6 of their last 9 games, while they are 1-5 SU in their last 6 at home.  The total has gone UNDER in 4 of their last 6 against the Dodgers and they are 6-14 SU in their last 20 against the Dodgers.  The Diamondbacks are 4-10 SU in their last 14 games at home against the Dodgers.

The total is set at 8 for this game, and it seems reasonable, but Kuroda has struggled at Chase Field, as mentioned.  If the Diamondbacks can get things cooking early, then there’s a good chance they can rattle Kuroda and crank out enough runs to put this total ‘over,’ though it is still a somewhat risky proposition.