Well that was nice of James Loney today.
Loney, who had 12 home runs this season heading into today's game against the Giants, waited until home game number 77 to finally hit his first home run of the season at Dodger Stadium as part of a 3 for 4 afternoon.
In all, the Blue smacked four home runs today as part of a 12-1 rout of the Giants. A first inning slam by Ronnie Belliard off former Dodger Brad Penny got the Dodgers off and running.
Matt Kemp preceded Loney's dinger with a solo shot of his own, part of a back-to-back job, and Blake DeWitt also added a solo shot of his own in the seventh inning. Jon Garland pitched eight brilliant innings today, giving the bullpen some much needed rest.
All this occurred after a rough night for the Blue last night. Vicente Padilla was ineffective for the first time as a Dodger, the offense struggled to come up with timely hits after they tied the game twice early after falling behind 1-0 and 4-1, and Chad Billingsley was even less effective in his first relief appearance of the season. All in all, despite home runs by Manny and Raffy Furcal, the 8-4 loss was one they'd just as soon forget, and today, they forgot about it.
Winning today might turn out to be bigger than they think as they have a tough task tomorrow afternoon having to face Tim Lincecum. Randy Wolf takes the hill for the Dodgers
As for Loney, he's been a tale of two hitters all season. While he's been superb on the road with .311/.389/.493 marks to go with his 12 home runs, at home, he's been a putrid .245/.317/.303 before today. Not to say the team need to address this in the off-season, but obviously they would hope for better consistency from him next season both at home and on the road, ot else they should address it.
As for now, they'll take anything they can get out of him, and Dodger fans would, too.
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