Dodgers Diaries

Sports Illustrated recently asked 306 big leaguers to rank the 15 toughest catchers to steal on. It's hard to argue with their perception that Yadier Molina is the best in the business. But the fact that AJ Ellis is nowhere on the list shows that opposing baserunners just haven’t been paying attention. Ellis ranks fifth in baseball at throwing out would-be stealers, behind Arizona’s Miguel Montero (with a whopping 50 percent success rate), Cincinnati's Ryan Hanigan, San Francisco's Hector Sanchez (Buster who?) and Philadelphia's Carlos Ruiz.

Joe Mauer, who placed 5th on the SI list, has thrown out just 15 percent of baserunners this year. Mike Napoli, supposedly inept at this task, has a better success rate. Yadier's older brother Jose Molina, ranked 8th, has thrown out just 3 of the 19 men who've tried to steal on him.

I don't know whether this is one of those stats that has more to do with pitchers than catchers. Certainly Ellis has been hurt by catching Ted Lilly, whose inability to hold runners on has allowed seven of nine baserunners to advance, and Kenley Jansen, who has never registered a caught-stealing in his short career (he's 0-for-2 in 2012).

What I do know is that this ranking, like the Gold Glove awards, seems to be based not on facts, but on reputation, much of which is established at the plate, rather than behind it. The funny thing is, Ellis has done just as much to acquit himself with the bat as with the glove. Then again, maybe this disrespect is what has made him so successful. Players think they can run on him, so they try it. But 39 percent of the time, they're wrong.

-- JOHN ROSENTHAL

If you made a movie about Thursday’s events, nobody would believe it. Down to their last strike in the bottom of the ninth, the comeback kid Dodgers get new life when Matt Holliday, a pretty good outfielder, can’t corral the third out. It lands for an error, James Loney runs hard all the way to second and the Dodgers are alive.

You know the rest: The walk by Casey Blake that put the winning run on base, and according to all in the Dodger clubhouse, gave the team hope that not only could they tie the game, but win it. The huge hit by the Jekyll and Hyde Ronnie Belliard. I’ve never seen a guy look so bad in some at-bats and so solid in others. Like Thursday’s game-tying single.

Holliday will get all the blame for this game, because his error would have been the final out. But Yadier Molina’s passed ball put the winning run 90 feet away. I have no doubt that Mark Loretta’s bloop would not have scored Blake from second base. But from third, it was a piece of cake. Then again, Loretta might not have batted, since Russell Martin was semi-intentionally walked.

Also deserving of goatee horns is Ryan Franklin, the closer who should've been out of the inning, but never got another out. Two walks and two singles later, he was the recipient of a blown save and a loss.

Only the diehards will remember the stellar pitching performances in this game, by both Adam Wainwright, who was robbed of a win, and Clayton Kershaw, who pitched well enough to merit one. Both youngsters kept piling up zeroes on the scoreboard. Andre Ethier is quietly putting up Manny-esque numbers. It’s only two games, to be sure, but he’s got a single, a double and a homer in seven at-bats, with a sick 1.556 OPS. He’s also making people forget that Manny has done quite little so far. Everybody goes into slumps, but when you hit like Ramirez did last year, fans come to expect it every year.

Put another way, when you’re as antic a player as Manny is, you had better put up Manny-esque numbers. Fans will only let Manny be Manny as long as he delivers. If he continues to hit .125, he might even become Juan Pierre’s backup. Naah; it’ll never happen.

--- JOHN ROSENTHAL