LOS ANGELES — The Dodgers aren’t ready to call the coroner’s office yet, but also realize they are facing a monumental task in trying to recover in this NLCS.
Not only is manager Don Mattingly’s crew down 2-0 in the series, which resumes on Monday at Dodger Stadium, but the Cardinals are prepared to unleash their ace against a slumping lineup that could again be missing its best hitter.
Hanley Ramirez vowed he will return for Game 3 against Adam Wainwright, but the Dodgers were awaiting results of a CT Scan on Sunday that would likely determine if the shortstop could play.
Ramirez was drilled in the left rib cage by a Joe Kelly fastball on Friday and missed Game 2 because he couldn’t swing a bat or raise his glove. Ramirez said he was no better on Sunday.
“I’ll do whatever it takes to be in the lineup,” Ramirez said after a team workout. “At this time of the year you just have to grind it.”
The Dodgers, when healthy, boast maybe the most formidable lineup in the National League. But they have gone scoreless in the last 19 innings of this series, a testament to the Cardinals bullpen and stud rookie Michael Wacha, who dominated them for 6²/₃ innings Saturday. The Cardinals won the game 1-0 after scoring an unearned run against Clayton Kershaw.
Nobody has looked worse than rookie slugger Yasiel Puig, who is hitless in 10 at-bats in the NLCS with six strikeouts. That included a Golden Sombrero on Saturday, but Mattingly said there are no plans to drop Puig in the batting order.
“We’ll continue to talk to him and as much as anything else, for him to get himself good pitches to hit and just got to keep going,” Mattingly said.
“Can’t let those two [games] turn into a third. He had a good series against Atlanta. His thinking was good. He’s been fairly patient in the sense of getting good counts here. So he’s just got to settle down, be himself and keep going.”
On top of Ramirez’s injury and Puig’s slump, the Dodgers are unsure if they will have Andre Ethier on Monday. Ethier played center field for the first time in three weeks on Friday and later had soreness in the left ankle that has bothered him in recent weeks.
The Dodgers’ last scoring in the series came in the third inning of Game 1, when Juan Uribe delivered a two-run single against Kelly. The Cardinals won the game 3-2 in 13 innings.
“We’re going to have to score some runs,” Dodgers catcher A.J. Ellis said. “Part of it is us not executing, and a big part of it is them making big pitches when they need to be made. Adam Wainwright is an amazing pitcher, one of the best in the whole National League, so we’re definitely fighting an uphill battle.”
Ramirez was asked what his health situation means for the Dodgers.
“It’s not tennis, anything like that, it’s not only one guy,” he said. “I am going to try 100 percent to go [Monday], until the last minute.”