Musings

• If you would have told me during Spring Training that Rod Barajas would be second on the club with 15 homers on Labor Day, I would have told you that this would be a team struggling to reach .500 this season.  Oh, wait...

• I'm not interested in Justin Sellers.  I have nothing against the guy, personally, but I just don't see how he benefits the 2012 Dodgers.

• Hats off to James Loney.  His .367/.433/.633 August was truly inspiring.  But I'm not convinced that James has fixed his swing.  Remember:  Loney hit .337 in June before nosediving to a .176 clip in July.  It's that kind of inconsistency that makes him impossible to count on. I just don't see how the Dodgers can move forward with Loney as the regular first baseman.  He's a complimentary piece, at best.

• Interesting that the Dodgers hot play through most of July and August hardly included two staples of Ned Colletti's 2012 planned offensive attack:  Casey Blake and Juan Uribe.  (I know how shocking that is to all of you).

• Can Matt Kemp and Clayton Kershaw pull off the 1-2 punch?  I'm thinking it's more and more likely.  As I said before, I believe that Cliff Lee and Roy Halladay will split at least a few Cy Young votes.  Likewise for Prince Fielder and Ryan Braun for the NL MVP campaign. 

• Call it blasphemy, but even Vin Scully's recent announcement that he will return to the microphone next season isn't enough to get me excited.  Only the addition of Prince Fielder, or something similar, would create such an emotion for me regarding next year's Dodgers.  It's going to be a long off season, indeed.