The Dodgers (33-32) have climbed back above .500 for the first time since April 23rd, and with five straight home games against teams with a combined 28-40 road record, they have the opportunity to create some space in the National League West.

It can’t be overstated how important it was for the Dodgers to earn a 2-1 series win over the Atlanta Braves last weekend. The NL East leading Braves are a good team showing signs of being a contender. At a time when the Dodgers have needed to develop into a scrappy team with injuries mounting, the confidence boost was everything.

Rather quietly, L.A. has shrugged off a poor start to be seventh in Major League Baseball in runs scored and in the upper half of all major team pitching stats. They’ve launched a league-best 26 home runs in the month of June.

Whom has been powering the offense in this late May–early June turnaround? Two rather unlikely candidates.

Max Muncy, the 27-year-old from Midland, Texas, had played in just 96 MLB games before joining the Dodgers (all with Oakland). He played for the Dodgers affiliate in Triple-A all through 2017, and was finally called up to the Dodgers on April 17th, 2018.

Since then, he has looked like this season’s Chris Taylor, tied for the team lead with 12 home runs and a healthy .272/.395/.616 slash line. Without his work rotating around the infield (third base and first base), it’s hard to imagine the Dodgers would be only three games back of the Diamondbacks right now.

In addition to Muncy’s emergence, the reemergence of Matt Kemp continues to be the talk of the club and the fans are starting to get involved. Kemp has the third most All-Star Game votes among National League outfielders (according to Ken Gurnick of Dodgers.com). He has the second-best batting average in the NL and is tenth in RBI. His fielding percentage is five points better than his career average.

Kemp hasn’t been an All-Star since 2012 (with Dodgers). It must be something about wearing Dodger Blue.

Tonight, Los Angeles open a two game set with the Texas Rangers. The game will feature perhaps one of the more interesting pitching matchups of the season.

Caleb Ferguson will make his second career start for the Dodgers against the ageless Bartolo Colon. Ferguson was born in 1996. Colon, 45, began his Major League career in 1997. That’s right–Colon has been a professional pitcher nearly all of Ferguson’s life.

They face each other at 7:10, and you can listen live to each inning on your Dodgers station KHTS FM 98.1.

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