'That's why you keep working.' How Mookie Betts snapped a slump at the perfect time

Mookie Betts spent so much time in the batting cage Thursday afternoon that his hands were raw, the Dodgers right fielder determined to find his stroke after his disappearing act in the first two games of a showdown series against the San Diego Padres.

“I took about 300 to 400 swings today,” Betts said. “I hit for like an hour and a half straight, and then I hit for 30 minutes earlier in the day, so I hit all day. This matters to me. I want to win. I know I go through these spells, but I promise you, it’s not from lack of effort.”

Betts enjoyed the fruits of that labor amid a beer-and-Champagne-drenched and cigar-smoke-filled clubhouse following the Dodgers’ 7-2 National League West-clinching victory over the Padres on Thursday night, a win that Betts helped author with a clutch two-run single in a decisive five-run seventh inning.

“I work my ass off every day, and sometimes you just don’t have it,” Betts said. “That’s why you keep working, because you never know.”

Betts had been in a funk for two weeks, batting .170 (nine for 53) with a .514 on-base-plus-slugging percentage, two homers and seven RBIs in his 13 games since Sept. 11, his only shining moment a walk-off homer in Sunday’s win over Colorado, and he hit a low point in the first two games against the Padres.

Betts went hitless in four at-bats with a strikeout Tuesday night, and he popped out in all four at-bats on Wednesday night — one to second base, one to third base, one to first base and one to shortstop — a feat that one writer deemed a “pop-cycle.”

Manager Dave Roberts didn’t think Betts was pressing as much as he was chasing too many pitches outside the strike zone, but for some, Betts’ struggles began to resemble those of last year’s NL Division Series, when Betts went 0 for 11 in a three-game sweep at the hands of the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Betts’ solution? He headed to the batting cage for a marathon hitting session.

Read more: Dodgers follow a different path in capturing their 11th NL West crown in 12 seasons

“We all saw him,” third baseman Max Muncy said. “I don’t know what’s going through his head, but his locker is next to mine, and I talk to him every day to gauge how he’s feeling. He’s so consistent with what he does every single day, and for him to say, I need to be putting in extra work, really says something. To see the results immediately was awesome.”

Betts stroked a one-out single to center field in the first inning, a hit that “relieved some pressure for everybody,” he said. “I’m just happy something fell.”

Betts popped out to shortstop in the fourth and grounded out to third in the sixth, the Dodgers unable to muster much resistance to Padres right-hander Joe Musgrove, who blanked the Dodgers on four hits through six innings to extend his scoreless streak to 18 innings in three starts.

But Musgrove, who gave up 11 hits, struck out 22 and walked none during the streak, walked Muncy to open the seventh. Will Smith pounced on a 3-and-1 fastball, sending a 426-foot drive over the center-field wall for a two-run homer that tied the score 2-2 and sent a jolt of energy through a sellout crowd of 52,433 in Dodger Stadium.

“You could feel the momentum shift,” Roberts said. “Musgrove dominated us for six innings, but that walk right there, and for Will to hit a big-boy home run gave us a lot of life. We just smelled blood.”

Musgrove struck out Tommy Edman and was pulled in favor of left-hander Tanner Scott, who gave up a single to pinch-hitter Kiké Hernández. Andy Pages’ bat hit the glove of catcher Kyle Higashioka as he swung at an 0-and-2 fastball for an interference call that put two on with one out.

“That was a huge play,” Roberts said of the catcher’s interference. “I didn’t have that one scripted. That wasn’t on my bingo card.”

Shohei Ohtani grounded an RBI single to right field for a 3-2 lead, Pages taking third on the hit and Ohtani advancing to second on a throwing error by right fielder Fernando Tatis Jr. Betts then hit a two-run single to right-center for a 5-2 lead.

Read more: Dodgers follow a different path in capturing their 11th NL West crown in 12 seasons

“Mookie hasn’t been Mookie the last couple of weeks,” Roberts said, “but you could see that excitement, that relief, after he got that big hit against Scott.”

Miguel Rojas sat out Thursday night’s game because of a left-adductor strain, but the veteran shortstop may have had a hand in what the Dodgers hope is a breakout game for Betts.

“After one of his popouts [Wednesday night], I picked up his bat, and it looked like an old bat that had no more hits in it,” Rojas said. “So today, before the game, I told Alex [Torres, clubhouse manager] to prepare another bat for Mookie the way he likes it, with the lizard skin on the handle, and to put it in his locker.

“I told him with this bat, you’re gonna come back and help us win, and he went two for four. That old bat wasn’t working. I’m not gonna take any credit because I know Mookie has been working his ass off in the cage to help us win, but that bat had something to do with it.”

Read more: Plaschke: No second guessing! Dodgers division title another triumph for Dave Roberts

This has been the most challenging season of a distinguished 11-year career for Betts, who moved from right field to second base this spring, only to be moved to shortstop — a position he hadn’t played regularly since high school —two weeks before the season opener against the Padres in South Korea.

Betts, the 2018 American League most valuable player, looked like he would give Ohtani a run for the NL MVP with a torrid 2 ½-month start before a 98-mph fastball fractured his left hand and he sat out two months from June to August.

The Dodgers also lost Muncy for three months because of a rib-cage strain, their rotation was ravaged by injuries, and first baseman Freddie Freeman was on crutches after suffering a right-ankle sprain Thursday night.

But Betts stood tall in the clubhouse late Thursday night, with a bottle of champagne in one hand, a cigar in the other and protective goggles on his cap, soaking in the revelry of a sometimes wild but relatively mild clinching party. The Dodgers had to fly to Colorado overnight for a regular season-ending series against the Rockies.

“I think each and every one of them is special in their own way,” Betts said of the celebration. “We have gone through a lot of injuries, and we still have a lot of guys hurt, but I still think we have enough here to win.”

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.