Another disappearing act by Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman could sink Dodgers in NLDS

SAN DIEGO — The Dodgers can’t afford another disappearing act. It could lead to – another disappearance.

A year ago, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman finished second and third in the National League Most Valuable Player Award voting – then went a combined 1 for 21 in the Dodgers’ NL Division Series flop against the Arizona Diamondbacks.

The duo has worn those numbers like scarlet letters ever since.

Freeman doubled the hit total with a pair of singles in Game 1 of this year’s NLDS against the San Diego Padres. But Freeman aggravated his ankle injury on a swing against a breaking ball from Yu Darvish and had to leave Game 2 after five innings. His availability for Game 3 on Tuesday night at Petco Park will be a game-time decision (as it was before Game 1).

“The thought is he’s going to play tomorrow. If he can’t, then he won’t,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “And then obviously, potentially, (left-hander Martin) Perez will take down Game 4 or the bulk of it (for the Padres). That might be a day that we might give him an extra day.

“But again – if he’s able to play and post, he’ll be in there.”

Betts has been able to play, but it has only made his pain deeper.

He walked three times in the Dodgers’ Game 1 victory (once intentionally) but otherwise has gone hitless in six at-bats in this series. He hasn’t had a postseason hit since a leadoff single in Game 3 of the 2022 NLDS against the Padres. Twenty-two hitless at-bats have followed.

“I can see the – I don’t know if it’s angst or the pressure of past performances starting to kind of bleed in. That’s something that I don’t want to happen. I understand it,” Roberts said.

“I’ll have a little conversation with him. The fact is you can’t change the last ‘X’ amount of postseason games. I understand the burden a player might have. But all anyone is concerned about is right now and how to best prepare yourself mentally for tomorrow night and the first at-bat. So that’s going to be basically my message.”

Forgetting about it, though, is “pretty impossible,” Betts said.

“Especially – you guys are doing your jobs but you’re asking me about it. So there’s no way to get away from it,” Betts said after Monday’s workout. “The whole world knows. It’s not like it’s a secret. I know. Nobody’s telling me anything I don’t know already. Nobody can be any harder on myself. Only thing I can really do is look forward but I know it’s there.

“I’m a human. I’m living it. Nobody’s telling me anything I haven’t already seen and know. I’m trying, man. That’s all I can say.”

One of his hitless at-bats in Game 2 cleared the fence in the left field corner at Dodger Stadium but Padres outfielder Jurickson Profar reached in and stole a home run from Betts.

Betts rejected that as a positive sign or a quality at-bat that just met an unfortunate end.

“It’s an out. It doesn’t matter if it’s a fly out, a ground out or a strikeout. It’s an out. It’s all the same,” Betts said Monday.

Betts’ postseason struggles go beyond the current 0-for-22 slump. He is also just 3 for his past 44 stretching back to the 2021 NLCS. And in 60 postseason games with the Dodgers and Boston Red Sox, the eight-time All-Star has hit .245 with a .700 OPS – numbers that are far from his career regular-season average of .294 and .897 OPS.

“You look at postseason performers – it’s not that they over-performed their career stat line in the regular season,” Roberts said. “What they’ve done is that they do what they’ve done in the regular season. But on that stage they’re considered postseason players. In this particular case, all we expect Mookie is to be the same player he is in the regular season. And that’s it.”

That he hasn’t been the same player in the postseason has created a narrative that Betts can’t perform under the pressure of the postseason. That narrative has gotten to Betts mentally, Roberts said.

“Yeah, I think so. I think so,” he said. “But I think that’s natural. … I think, certainly, there’s been a lot of talk of it. He’s mentioned it himself.

“For me, it’s two games (in this NLDS) and it’s four or five official at-bats. So, for me, I just don’t want to get too caught up, and, most importantly, for him to get caught up into that.”

Betts turned 32 years old Monday and spent it taking hundreds of swings in the batting cage and on the field at Petco Park.

“If there’s another way, please let me know,” Betts said when asked if he was trying to swing his way out of his slump.