A few of Freddie Freeman’s best moments as a Dodger have are available matchups towards his outdated crew, the Atlanta Braves.
When the Dodgers introduced their lineup for Monday’s collection opener towards Atlanta at Dodger Stadium, nevertheless, the 35-year-old first baseman was not a part of it.
Seems, after hitting a house run and an RBI double within the Dodgers’ victory towards the Detroit Tigers on Saturday, Freeman slipped whereas entering into his bathe at residence later that night time, in keeping with supervisor Dave Roberts, aggravating the correct ankle he badly sprained on the finish of final season and had surgically repaired.
“He had a little mishap in the shower,” Roberts mentioned. “It swelled up a little bit. Not able to play tonight.”
Freeman is taken into account day after day, and might be re-evaluated Tuesday.
Monday will already mark the third recreation Freeman has missed this season. Throughout the crew’s season-opening journey to Tokyo, he was held out of each video games towards the Chicago Cubs after feeling discomfort in his left ribs — in the identical space he battled his different postseason damage final yr, damaged rib cartilage — throughout pregame batting apply on opening day.
Whereas Freeman was capable of return from that difficulty as soon as the crew returned residence, his ankle had nonetheless been lower than 100% even earlier than Saturday’s bathe incident. It’s a part of the explanation why the crew determined to train warning with Freeman on Monday; though the previous Braves star has hit .299 with 12 RBIs in 20 video games towards his outdated crew since signing with the Dodgers in 2022, and was in a “good spot” together with his swing popping out of Saturday’s recreation, as Roberts acknowledged.
“He feels that he could go out there and play,” Roberts added. “But just the upside-downside, doing the math, just let him recoup today, and we’ll see how he is tomorrow.”
With Freeman out of the lineup, Kiké Hernández was slated to begin at first base. It marked Hernández’s first recreation because the Tokyo Sequence due to a abdomen sickness that sidelined him for the crew’s sweep of the Tigers final weekend.
Torpedoes incoming
Dodgers gamers and coaches had been simply as shocked as the remainder of the baseball world upon studying of the bowling-pin-shaped “torpedo” bats that some New York Yankees gamers had been utilizing final weekend, once they mashed a whopping 15 residence runs in a three-game sweep of the Milwaukee Brewers.
However by Monday, intrigue within the new bat design was excessive among the many crew, with a number of gamers noting they already had orders for their very own torpedo bats on the best way.
“I mean, it sounds interesting,” co-hitting coach Robert Van Scoyoc mentioned. “I think guys will try it. I mean, how do you not, right? You see those kinds of outcomes, of course.”
Third baseman Max Muncy is likely one of the Dodgers hitters planning to experiment with the brand new design — wherein the fattest a part of the barrel is moved nearer to the deal with to extend contact high quality on swings that earlier than would have jammed a hitter.
He mentioned he had some approaching an in a single day cargo, and was excited to see what he hoped could be a uncommon “major innovation” in bat design.
“For me, it’s exciting just because there hasn’t been much of this,” Muncy mentioned, noting that outdoors of the wooden varieties and deal with variations, bats have largely remained unchanged over the historical past of the game.
“They had 100 different bat models [already], shaped this way, shaped that way,” he added. “But nothing’s ever been as drastic as what this is.”
Muncy nonetheless had questions concerning the torpedo bats, which had been designed by an MIT-educated former physics professor who labored for the Yankees the previous a number of seasons.
In his personal swing, Muncy famous, he sometimes hits the ball nearer to the tip of the bat; a spot the place, on the torpedo design, the barrel tapers off.
“This might actually be a detriment to me,” he laughed.
“If this is something that truly works, I think it’s exciting for the game of baseball, for the offensive side,” he mentioned. “I’m just intrigued by all of it.”
