Mandatory Credit: Kiyoshi Mio-Imagn Images

“It Looks Like We Don’t Care”: Mookie Betts Gets Real on Dodgers’ Struggles

"If we panic, things get worse"

Mandatory Credit: Kiyoshi Mio-Imagn Images

I know I say this way too often, but every time the Dodgers lose, it’s a reminder: they can be beaten. It might take a miracle, a meltdown, or a week where nothing works out for them, but yes, the Dodgers are human.

The Los Angeles Dodgers aren’t pretending their current form is fine. They’re just not ready to set off any alarms yet. With names like Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, and Freddie Freeman plastered across a $400 million roster, they believe the offense will eventually correct itself. But at the moment, it’s not.

After a red-hot 8-0 start to the season, the Dodgers have now lost three consecutive series, their latest a 4-2 defeat to the Cubs at Dodger Stadium. And this isn’t just a dip. It’s been a nosedive.

The runs have dried up. The power has cooled.

A team that was steamrolling opponents suddenly looks like it’s stuck in neutral. Over the last nine games, the Dodgers are averaging just over three runs per outing, a stark contrast to their first stretch, when the lineup looked like it belonged to a video game. Even with Betts and Ohtani continuing to contribute at the top of the order, the rest of the lineup has failed to string anything together.

This was the Dodgers' worst shutout loss (16-0) since 1965, and their worst at home in franchise history, eclipsing their 15-0 loss in 1898 to the Pirates.
— Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) April 13, 2025

“We got our butts kicked,” manager Dave Roberts said bluntly after Saturday night’s blowout shutout loss, the worst in Dodgers home history.

Mookie Betts Isn’t Very Happy Either

Fans booed. Social media fumed, and Mookie Betts was as honest as you can be.

Mookie Betts: “I think it's just a bumpy two weeks. We got a long time, we got a long season to go and a lot can happen. This isn't the first time we sucked for two weeks, it just happens that it's right now. If we panic, things get worse. If we don't panic, it looks like we…
— Dodger Blue (@DodgerBlue1958) April 14, 2025

“I think it’s just a bumpy two weeks. We got a long time, we got a long season to go and a lot can happen,” Betts said. “This isn’t the first time we sucked for two weeks, it just happens that it’s right now. If we panic, things get worse. If we don’t panic, it looks like we don’t care. So what are we supposed to do?”

It’s the kind of catch-22 every contender faces eventually. When the bar is set sky-high, even a modest slump becomes a crisis.

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But the Dodgers aren’t in crisis, not yet. Not in April. The calendar is screaming that it’s way too early to make any sweeping declarations. But baseball’s weird that way, the early-season vibes don’t always tell the truth, but they often reveal just enough to make you look twice.

And right now, the Dodgers are giving everyone a reason to keep watching, just not in the way they’d prefer.

Dodgers

Mookie Betts

Mohsin Baldiwala

mlb

Mohsin Baldiwala is a Master’s student in Journalism and freelance content producer who got hooked on baseball through Seinfeld’s hapless George Costanza. The same reason why he’s a Yankees fan. He writes about sports because he believes it can offer a brief escape from the world’s chaos. Even if that means enduring the heartbreak of the 2024 World Series.