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LOS ANGELES -- Five-tool players are a hot commodity in the major leagues. Zack Greinke is forming his own category. Call it a four-tool pitcher.

Greinke continued his masterful pitching this season with seven solid innings Sunday against the visiting San Diego Padres, leading the Los Angeles Dodgers to a 2-1 victory and a series sweep.

His contributions didn’t end there, however.

Greinke also continues to see the ball well at the plate and was one of the few Dodgers to hit San Diego starter Tyson Ross. He collected a solid single up the middle and flew out to deep left-center, boosting his batting average to .347.

And if that wasn’t enough, Greinke also stole second with a head-first slide in the fifth inning, becoming the first L.A. pitcher to steal two bases in a season since Orel Hershiser in 1987.

The fourth tool? Greinke hasn't committed a fielding error in more than three years.

Greinke, who has won his past six starts to improve to 14-3, certainly didn’t lead the Dodgers by himself Sunday.
Yasiel Puig blasted his 14th homer of the season to break a 1-1 tie in the bottom of the sixth and Mark Ellis delivered a clutch two-out single in the third to tie the score.

Paco Rodriguez came out of the bullpen with the tying run on third and one out in the eighth and struck out leadoff hitter Will Venable before getting pinch hitter Chris Denorfia to ground out to the mound.

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LOS ANGELES -- Dodgers reliever Brian Wilson entered the clubhouse Sunday morning, looking like he just left a Grateful Dead concert. He wore a purple knit cap atop his jet-black hair, with a few loosely fastened dreadlocks flowing out the sides.

Juan Uribe and Hanley Ramirez burst out in laughter as Wilson strutted across the room, dropping a few barbs along the way. Wilson didn’t let those remarks sink in long before shooting back at Uribe, reminding him of the purple slacks he wore to Saturday’s game.

The Los Angeles Dodgers seem to sport a new look on a daily basis, and lately, that’s included a few new faces. Wilson made his Dodgers debut last week, giving the bullpen another veteran arm with World Series experience, as well as some personality to an already quirky locker room.

On Saturday night it was Michael Young who joined the fold. The veteran infielder was acquired from the Philadelphia Phillies in exchange for a minor league pitcher, giving the Dodgers another player with World Series experience, a batting title, a Gold Glove and seven All-Star appearances -- one of which led to the MVP award in the 2006 game.

There were a few furrowed brows when Young’s trade was announced, however.

After all, the Dodgers went 23-6 in August and have been satisfied with the play of Uribe at third base, the position Young has mainly played the past few seasons. The same can be said for second base, where Mark Ellis has been solid when healthy. Nick Punto has also done a stellar job occupying a utility role among the infielders.

The person responsible for integrating another new player into the mix, manager Don Mattingly, didn’t seem too concerned with that task prior to Sunday’s series finale against the visiting San Diego Padres.

“We’re not trying to bring Michael in here to knock Adrian [Gonzalez] off first base,” Mattingly said. “Michael’s here to add to our club, to give us added depth, give us a guy that can do a lot of things.”

Mattingly said he spoke with Young after the trade and “just wanted to make sure this wasn’t something that turned him upside down.”

“We’re not getting a young kid in the prime of his career, and I say that with all due respect,” Mattingly said. “This guy has had a career that he has done a lot of things, but he’s at a point also in his career where you understand where you’re at. We’re going to treat him with respect, make sure I’m honest with him about everything and just see where it goes.”

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LOS ANGELES -- The minute he walked out of the Dodgers' interview room, where he discussed the trade for veteran infielder Michael Young on Saturday night, general manager Ned Colletti reached Young on his cellphone.

Colletti said Young understood he won't be walking into the kind of role he had in Philadelphia, where he has had more than 500 plate appearances, or that he had in Texas, where he was the face of the franchise.

Colletti said Young was willing to accept a lesser role for a third crack at a World Series title.

"He could have vetoed the whole thing," Colletti said.

The Dodgers aren't interested in a move that could risk changing their direction. When you're coming off the best calendar month (23-6) in Los Angeles franchise history, when you have made up 20 games in the standings in less than 10 weeks, radical change really doesn't jump out as a good idea.

For a team that almost never loses, the Dodgers have been pretty busy making changes. They've added relievers Brian Wilson and Carlos Marmol, and starting pitcher Edinson Volquez. Now they add Young despite the fact that Young's .722 OPS is identical to that of their starting third baseman, Juan Uribe, and that Young isn't nearly the defender Uribe is.

It wasn't Colletti's intention to upset the apple cart, just to add a little more sustenance to the Dodgers' moveable feast. It's about depth. It's about competition. It's about experience.

"I kept it in the back of my mind for a while, because I didn't want to disrupt what we have going on here," Colletti said. "I think the room is great."

Of course, you could argue, then why do it?

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LOS ANGELES – Matt Kemp hasn't had any physical setbacks in his return from an ankle injury, but he hasn't felt comfortable at the plate and the Dodgers are exploring other ways to extend his minor-league rehab assignment.

Kemp is 0-for-8 with three strikeouts in two games for Class-A Rancho Cucamonga. Rancho's season ends Monday, but the Quakes are in the lead for a playoff spot and Dodgers manager Don Mattingly said Kemp could play games there or in the instructional league in Arizona.

Kemp has at least two more scheduled games in Rancho Cucamonga.

"From listening to [trainer] Stan [Conte], Matt's saying he's not comfortable baseball-wise," Mattingly said. "Matt's not going to want to come back if he's not swinging the bat well."

Kemp's return will create an awkward arrangement of four everyday outfielders for three spots.

* Umpire Greg Gibson pulled Mattingly aside during Friday night's game and told him the maroon bats used by Carl Crawford and Hanley Ramirez may not comply with Major League Baseball rules. He also said the Dodgers are not allowed to stand in the camera well during games.

According to the Dodgers, all the bats their players use are pre-approved by MLB.

Here are lineups for Saturday's game vs. the San Diego Padres:

San Diego

1. Chris Denorfia RF
2. Will Venable CF
3. Jedd Gyorko 2B
4. Jesus Guzman 1B
5. Kyle Blanks LF
6. Logan Forsythe 3B
7. Ronny Cedeno SS
8. Rene Rivera C
9. Andrew Cashner RHP

Dodgers

1. Carl Crawford LF
2. Yasiel Puig RF
3. Adrian Gonzalez 1B
4. Hanley Ramirez SS
5. Andre Ethier CF
6. Juan Uribe 3B
7. Skip Schumaker 2B
8. Tim Federowicz C
9. Chris Capuano LHP

LOS ANGELES -- Somebody asked Yasiel Puig how he had received the message from two days earlier.

"Which message?" Puig said in Spanish.

Good point. Was it the text message from his mom, the voice mail from his friend or the 45 new email messages in his inbox? You must admit, there are a lot of messages nowadays.

One of the beautiful things about the entire Puig experience is that, no matter how much drama swirls around him, how much attention he gets on TV, the Web, the Twitter-verse, the newspapers, radio, telegraph, messages in a bottle and word on the street, he doesn't seem to care.

He had a bemused smile when he described his approach to Friday.

"I just came to play baseball, like I always do," Puig said.

And he's going to play it, essentially, his way. That's pretty clear by now. Should we all just get out of the way and watch where it goes?

The Dodgers took early batting practice Friday afternoon. Among the participants was 10-year veteran Adrian Gonzalez, but not Puig, who has yet to polish off his third month in the major leagues.

It's easy to find fault with that. Puig had been pulled after four innings in the previous game for loafing in right field following a bad at-bat. Showing up for early work Friday might have shown that he was properly chastened. But Puig doesn't seem the type to be deferential, and once again he had the perfect response. He produced.

The last time Don Mattingly benched him, Puig hit the decisive home run after entering as a defensive replacement. This time, he went 4-for-5 with an RBI, a double and two stolen bases in the Dodgers' 9-2 win over the San Diego Padres. He was in the middle of two of the Dodgers' three scoring rallies. This was a more complete answer to his critics, more impressive than one swing on a first pitch in Miami.

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LOS ANGELES -- If there is a common thread between the acquisitions of Carlos Marmol and Edinson Volquez, it's pitching coach Rick Honeycutt.

In both cases, general manager Ned Colletti asked Honeycutt to look at tape of the struggling pitchers before striking deals. In both cases, Honeycutt said he thought he could help the pitchers get back on track.

If Marmol is any indication, the Dodgers might be able to salvage something from Volquez, the former San Diego Padres starter with the 6.01 ERA whom they signed Friday. Marmol had a 5.86 ERA with the Chicago Cubs, but since working with Honeycutt, he has changed his fortunes. All 10 of Marmol's August appearances have been scoreless.

Neither pitchers' struggles could be linked to a decline in velocity, part of the reason the Dodgers were encouraged to pursue them. According to Fangraphs, Marmol's average fastball this season has been 93.3 mph. Volquez's has been 92.3 mph.

Marmol said Honeycutt got him to stand up straighter before going into his delivery.

"It feels great, especially to be pitching for a team that wins every day," Marmol said.

Volquez's final straw in San Diego was an Aug. 23 start, in which he gave up six runs in two-thirds of an inning to the Chicago Cubs. Volquez will pitch in relief for the Dodgers initially, but he figures to make a few starts in September as well, according to Colletti.

"The pitching coach [in San Diego], he did everything he could to get me better," Volquez said. "Sometimes, it doesn't work out the way you want it to. This is the first year I'm struggling."

Here are lineups for Friday's game against the team that just released Volquez:

San Diego

1. Chris Denorfia RF
2. Will Venable CF
3. Jedd Gyorko 2B
4. Yonder Alonso 1B
5. Jesus Guzman LF
6. Logan Forsythe 3B
7. Nick Hundley C
8. Ronny Cedeno SS
9. Eric Stults LHP

Dodgers

1. Yasiel Puig RF
2. Carl Crawford LF
3. Hanley Ramirez SS
4. Adrian Gonzalez 1B
5. A.J. Ellis C
6. Andre Ethier CF
7. Mark Ellis 2B
8. Juan Uribe 3B
9. Hyun-Jin Ryu LHP

LOS ANGELES -- Ricky Nolasco had just pitched one of the games of his life Wednesday afternoon and about one-third of the questions he fielded from reporters afterward had to do with the benching of Yasiel Puig.

That's probably not what he wanted to talk about at that very moment.

As has been pointed out many times, perfectly accurately, none of Puig's transgressions alone has been a particularly big deal. If you've seen the traffic in Miami, you wouldn't blame him for being 40 minutes late to a game. Do Dodgers fans really want to get on somebody for showing up late because of traffic?

For every nine or 10 cutoff men he overshoots, he'll throw out one baserunner at a crucial point in a game. If he makes an out on the bases and drives in three, that's a net gain, right?

But there are two reasons this pattern of petty Puig transgressions -- two benchings and a fine (at least) -- is becoming a troubling one for the Dodgers. Firstly, it is a distraction, one the Dodgers have played through but probably won't want to deal with when the bright lights come on in early October.

Secondly, it could be just the tip of the iceberg. Manager Don Mattingly said several times in his postgame comments after pulling Puig from Wednesday's game for undisclosed disciplinary reasons that he preferred to keep the issue "in house."

In my experience, teams keep a lid on the vast majority of conflicts that arise during a season, and it's fair to wonder if there have been bigger issues that never became public.

Mattingly has to be torn. On the one hand, he needs to keep one of the most talented young players in baseball happy and productive. That's probably the top imperative. On the other, he has to show the other players on the team that he doesn't have one set of standards for 24 of them and another set for one.

The best thing he can probably do is continue to teach with compassion. It seems to be what he's trying to do. There is only sporadic evidence that Puig is listening, but there is some.

"I talk to him like I would talk to my kids. I try to be honest with him in what I think," Mattingly said. "I have to represent the whole ballclub with some decisions that I make."

If that doesn't work, there's not much more a manager can do, aside, of course, from making out his lineup card without Puig's name on it. It seems like those days are still well down the road.

LOS ANGELES – Even as the rest of the team has simmered down in the past week, Dodgers starting pitching has continued to cook. For a while, it was driven by an apparent synergy between Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke, but now Ricky Nolasco has joined the mix.

Nolasco pitched his second consecutive eight-inning shutout in the Dodgers’ 4-0 win over the Chicago Cubs Wednesday afternoon at Dodger Stadium, striking out a season-high 11 batters.

Kershaw, Greinke and Nolasco together have gone 13-2 this month. Both of those losses belong to Kershaw, who has a 1.01 ERA this month. You don’t need to go much deeper than that to understand why the Dodgers are in the process of polishing off one of the best months in franchise history. They are 21-6 in August.

Since the Dodgers landed Nolasco from the Miami Marlins on July 6, he is 6-1 with a 2.20 ERA.

It looked like bad news for the Cubs in the first inning, when Nolasco used a nasty curveball to help him get a couple of strikeouts. Nolasco’s success often is predicated on the effectiveness of his breaking pitches.

Nolasco was coming off his best start of the season. He shut out the Boston Red Sox over eight innings in the Dodgers’ 2-0 win Friday night.

As is often the case, there was more drama with Yasiel Puig. The rookie was taken out of the game following the fourth inning and replaced by utility man Skip Schumaker. The Dodgers said the move was made at the “manager’s discretion.”

Puig went into second base standing up in the first inning rather than trying to break up a double play, a decision that may have cost the Dodgers a run after Hanley Ramirez homered. He also made two catches in right field in the fourth, snatching the ball in a nonchalant manner.

Andre Ethier hit a solo home run off Edwin Jackson in the fourth inning and then Jackson’s errant throw helped them score a couple of more in the fifth. Jackson had a play at third on Nolasco’s bunt, but skipped the throw past Cody Ransom and into foul ground.

LOS ANGELES -- Adrian Gonzalez, who has played more games than any other Dodger, got a rare day off Wednesday, allowing manager Don Mattingly to try a new lineup combination.

Carl Crawford, who had batted nothing but leadoff up to Wednesday, was hitting second, with Yasiel Puig in the No. 1 spot in the order.

The lineup tweak was necessitated by some fatigue Mattingly detected in Gonzalez Tuesday night -- "He was dragging pretty good," Mattingly said -- but could open the door for further experiments. Mattingly is considering a Puig-Crawford-Hanley Ramirez-Gonzalez grouping against left-handers and a Crawford-Puig-Gonzalez-Ramirez grouping vs. righties.

In both cases, he would have ideal left-right balance.

* Matt Kemp did some agility drills and ran swerves on the field before the game and appears to be on track to begin his minor-league rehab assignment either Thursday or Friday. Coming off the field, he told ESPNLA 710's Beto Duran, "I feel wonderful."

* Mattingly said ace Clayton Kershaw received no treatment for the line drive he took off his right shin Tuesday night and Kershaw was the first face Mattingly saw when he went into the Dodgers' workout room Wednesday morning.

Here are lineups for Wednesday:

Chicago
1. Starlin Castro SS
2. Darwin Barney 2B
3. Anthony Rizzo 1B
4. Nate Schierholtz RF
5. Brian Bogusevic LF
6. Junior Lake CF
7. Wellington Castillo C
8. Cody Ransom 3B
9. Edwin Jackson RHP

Dodgers
1. Yasiel Puig RF
2. Carl Crawford LF
3. Hanley Ramirez SS
4. Andre Ethier CF
5. Jerry Hairston Jr. 1B
6. Mark Ellis 2B
7. Juan Uribe 3B
8. Tim Federowicz C
9. Ricky Nolasco RHP

LOS ANGELES -- The Dodgers will wake up Wednesday morning to one of the commonplace nuisances of a baseball season.

After playing for nearly 3½ hours Tuesday night -- probably not getting into their beds until well after midnight -- they have to be on the field and alert by 12:10 p.m. for the rare midweek day game at Dodger Stadium.

Just in the previous week, the Dodgers had start times of 9:40 a.m., 1 p.m., 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. -- all Pacific Time -- though they’ve flown through three time zones. Think that can’t throw off your equilibrium just a tad?

Not that any of that is to make an excuse for this little patch of turbulence -- three losses in their past four games -- but it might not entirely be a coincidence. The Dodgers weren’t going to play .800 baseball for the rest of this season, it seems fair to surmise, so now we get to see how the highest-flying team in baseball handles the dog days.

They’re finally here. The Dodgers have scored 13 runs in their past five games, and even Clayton Kershaw, whose 2013 season has been unrelentingly dominant, looked fatigued at times during Tuesday’s 3-2 loss.

“I think we’ve got some guys that are a little bit tired,” manager Don Mattingly said.

Kershaw (13-8), by the way, isn’t admitting to being tired. Nor did he think the line drive he took off his right shin in the sixth inning will be something that causes him to miss any time.

Then again, he told me he felt great last season the day before it was revealed that he had been battling a painful hip condition, one that would cause him to miss two starts. He’s not one to confess to physical maladies easily. In fact, Mattingly said Kershaw was mad at the “fuss” being made over him when the manager and a trainer came to check on him during that inning.

It’s been a while since the Dodgers had anything to complain about, so now we get to see how they respond to this tiny bit of adversity -- the first in months -- since Mattingly's job status was a daily distraction.

“You probably don’t anticipate us winning 80 percent of our games, but at the same time, you don’t ever think about losing, either,” Kershaw said. “I don’t know if it was bound to happen or not, but we’ve just got to come in tomorrow and win.”

They’d better set their alarm clocks.

LOS ANGELES -- Clayton Kershaw had one of those games in which everything looked difficult, and the Dodgers never quite recovered in a 3-2 loss to the Chicago Cubs on Tuesday night.

The 52,326 fans who showed up -- tipping the Los Angeles Dodgers over the three-million mark with 14 home games remaining -- still got some late-game excitement. An eighth-inning rally stalled and Yasiel Puig popped up, swinging at the first pitch, to end the game with the tying run at first.

Kershaw trudged through the first inning and never seemed entirely comfortable after that. The Cubs made him throw 29 pitches in the inning, and he needed to go to some of his nastiest breaking pitches early in the game to get strikeouts of Donnie Murphy and Junior Lake in order to keep it scoreless.

The Cubs didn’t break through to score off Kershaw until the third, on Dioner Navarro’s RBI single. Because one of the runners in the inning had gotten on via catcher’s interference, the run was unearned. In fact, despite one of his shakiest starts of the season, Kershaw’s ERA remained at 1.72, so Tuesday likely will have minimal impact on his Cy Young candidacy.

It might even help a little. Kershaw struck out nine Cubs batters and has 197 for the season. He’s about to become the third Dodgers pitcher to have 200 strikeouts in four consecutive seasons. The other two are named Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale.

And Tuesday could have been worse. Way worse. Cody Ransom lined a ball off Kershaw's right leg for a single in the sixth inning, but Kershaw initially tried waving off manager Don Mattingly and a trainer. When they kept coming any way, he stayed in the game after a couple of warm-up tosses.

The Dodgers haven't done Kershaw any favors offensively when he struggles, even just a little. In his eight losses, the team has scored a total of 12 runs.

The Dodgers made scant headway against Cubs left-hander Travis Wood, who is having a highly respectable season on a bad team. The Dodgers didn’t score until Juan Uribe’s two-out RBI single in the sixth inning.

Once they got Wood out of the game, the Dodgers looked like they would stage one of the late-inning comebacks that have been commonplace at Dodger Stadium the past two months. Andre Ethier drove in a run with a sharp single up the middle off Pedro Strop, but pinch hitter Skip Schumaker hit into an inning-ending double play.

LOS ANGELES -- The first time Dodgers manager Don Mattingly had to fit four outfielders into three spots, he indicated that Yasiel Puig would be the hardest to take out of his lineup. Puig was batting .369 at the time.

Now, with Matt Kemp likely to return next week and Puig in a two-week slump, Mattingly indicated he could try to spot the rookie outfielder a few more days off here and there. Puig is batting .220 with two home runs and four RBIs in his past 16 games.

"I think, sometimes, he gets a little tired," Mattingly said. "He may not think that, but I just think mentally, sometimes, he gets more down. This is probably the most games he's played in a while, and it's pretty intense.

"Obviously, he gets quite a bit of attention, so everything he does he's had to be questioned about, and he's been really good. Mentally, sometimes I see him looking a little tired."

Mattingly could have some egos to juggle in the final month of the season, with Kemp saying Tuesday he still views himself as the team's every-day center fielder. Andre Ethier has played center since Kemp has been out and Ethier has emerged as one of the Dodgers' steadiest contributors. He is batting .296 with a .388 on-base percentage since he moved to center field.

Here are lineups for Tuesday night's game with the Chicago Cubs:

Chicago
1. Starlin Castro SS
2. Darwin Barney 2B
3. Dioner Navarro C
4. Donnie Murphy 3B
5. Junior Lake CF
6. Cody Ransom 1B
7. Darnell McDonald LF
8. Cole Gillespie RF
9. Travis Wood LHP

Dodgers
1. Carl Crawford LF
2. Yasiel Puig RF
3. Adrian Gonzalez 1B
4. Hanley Ramirez SS
5. Mark Ellis 2B
6. Andre Ethier CF
7. Juan Uribe 3B
8. A.J. Ellis C
9. Clayton Kershaw LHP

Clayton Kershaw looks to keep his amazing 2013 going when the Los Angeles Dodgers face the Chicago Cubs tonight.

Kershaw's history against the Cubs is stellar-- he's made four starts against them and allowed two runs or fewer in each.

But what about Kershaw and big-picture history?

With the help of Baseball-Reference.com, here’s a snapshot of where Kershaw stands in statistical history with what is likely six starts left in his season.

Amazing ERA
Kershaw enters with a 1.72 ERA. In the last 30 seasons, only two pitchers have qualified for the ERA title with an ERA that low at season’s end: Dwight Gooden (1.53 for the New York Mets in 1985) and Greg Maddux (1.56 in 1994 and 1.63 in 1995, both with the Atlanta Braves).

It is extraordinarily rare for a left-handed pitcher to finish a season with that low an ERA. In baseball’s live ball era, the only one to do so was Hall-of-Famer Carl Hubbell, who had a 1.66 ERA for the 1933 New York Giants. The last before him was Rube Marquard, who posted a 1.58 ERA for the 1916 Brooklyn Robins (who became the Dodgers).

Also rare: for a southpaw to finish with that good of an ERA relative to his league. Baseball-Reference tracks ERA+, which measures that, adjusting slightly for his primary ballpark.

Kershaw’s ERA+ is currently 207 (his ERA is 1.72, the NL ERA is 3.74). Only three lefties since 1900 have had an ERA+ that good, the last being Ron Guidry (208 for the 1978 New York Yankees). Only one of those three was a National Leaguer—Jack Pfiester for the 1907 Chicago Cubs (216).

Unhittable
Opponents are hitting .182 against Kershaw this season. The last ERA-title qualifying pitcher to finish a season with that low an opponents’ batting average was Pedro Martinez (.167) for the 2000 Boston Red Sox.

The last lefthander to do so was a former Dodger, though only for a few moments: Sid Fernandez (who made two appearances for the 1983 team) held hitters to a .181 batting average for the 1985 Mets.

There have been six pitchers in the divisional era (since 1969) that finished a season with an opponents’ batting average that low. The only Dodgers pitcher among them was Hideo Nomo, whose was also .182 in his rookie season, 1995.

For those looking to make the inevitable comparison to Sandy Koufax, the Dodgers legendary lefty had one season with an opponents’ batting average that low, 1965, when opposing hitters batted .179 against him.

And if you prefer OPS to batting average, Kershaw’s currently stands at .495. Only three pitchers have held opposing hitters below .500 since Bob Gibson and Luis Tiant both did so in the Year of the Pitcher, 1968: Nolan Ryan (.496, 1981 Houston Astros), Maddux (.482, 1995 Braves), and Martinez (.473, 2000 Red Sox).

The Whiffs
Kershaw currently has 188 strikeouts and it seems inevitable he’ll reach 200, perhaps as soon as tonight.

He would become the third Dodgers pitcher to record at least four straight seasons with 200 or more strikeouts, joining Koufax (six straight from 1961 to 1966) and Don Drysdale (four straight from 1962 to 1965).

Scoreless Streak
Lastly, perhaps it’s wishful thinking, but Kershaw enters tonight with a 16-inning scoreless streak. If he throws seven scoreless innings of each of his next six starts, he’ll match Don Drysdale for the second-longest scoreless streak in major-league history.

And he would be one inning shy of Orel Hershiser’s record streak. That streak began 25 years ago Friday.

In most seasons, for most teams, a 4-3 record in a week that started 2,400 miles from home and concluded against one of the best teams in baseball would be considered successful. For the 2013 Dodgers, you’d have to consider it a mild disappointment.

After doing what you would have expected them to do in Miami, they came home and lost a series to the Boston Red Sox. Before that, they hadn’t lost a series since mid-June.

They ran into very tough Boston starting pitching and the offense in the past week or so has shown some signs of tapering off.

Not that it was a bad week if you’re a Dodger fans. Vin Scully announced he’s returning next season for his 65^th year in the broadcast booth. Scully said the excitement of the team’s dramatic season was one of the reasons he decided to come back.

SCORING

For a while, one of the most impressive aspects of the Dodgers’ surge was their ability to beat quality, sometimes even dominant, starting pitchers. Cliff Lee. Matt Harvey. Shelby Miller. It didn’t matter. The Dodgers somehow got the better of some difficult matchups.

Last week, they settled into a more-pedestrian pattern. They scored off the pitchers you would expect them to score on and looked human against the others. Jose Fernandez, Jake Peavy and Jon Lester all essentially shut them down.

The Dodgers averaged three runs per game, which is closer to their April and May pace than what they’ve shown since. Still, given the pitchers they were facing, it’s all entirely forgivable.

It’s appropriate that Boston was in town on the one-year anniversary of the big trade. Two of the key cogs from that trade have been, once again, keeping the Dodgers offense moving forward. Carl Crawford batted .333 with three walks and a couple of stolen bases. Adrian Gonzalez hit .296 , homered and drove in four runs.

Otherwise, it was a ho-hum week, with phenom Yasiel Puig (.167) struggling as badly as anyone.

Grade: C

DEFENSE

The Dodgers are seeing exactly the kind of dynamic in their pitching staff that can make a team difficult to handle in October. Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke are becoming the best 1-2 combination of starters in the National League.

But it’s not just about them. Ricky Nolasco missed facing his former team when the Dodgers were in Miami, but he made sure the Boston series wasn’t a total loss by giving up just two hits, striking out six, in Friday’s 2-0 win.

The bullpen wasn’t quite as stout as it had been in previous weeks, with J.P. Howell, Brandon League and Chris Withrow all getting hit at times, but in the key spots, it generally held firm. Kenley Jansen has taken all the drama out of the last inning. He had three saves and allowed just one runner to reach base. Carlos Marmol pitched well, cementing his place in the bullpen.

If you were going to comb through this Dodgers team for a flaw, you would say occasionally sloppy defense could be their downfall. They have made 90 errors this season, worse than all but three teams in the NL. Then again, this trend -- like so many others -- seems to be going in a positive direction.

After making a couple of punishing errors in a loss to the Philadelphia Phillies, Hanley Ramirez played a clean week of defense. He might be the Dodgers’ most-improved fielder.

Grade: A-

DECISION-MAKING

There’s another trade deadline on the way. The non-waiver period has already passed, but if teams acquire a player before Saturday, that player would be eligible for the post-season roster.

But, even if general manager Ned Colletti found a team willing to move a major piece, what area does he really need to improve? Brian Wilson and Marmol look like they might be the veteran relievers the Dodgers were looking for before the July 31 deadline.

They could try to land another starting pitcher, but considering they’ll only need four once the playoffs begin, even that would be surprising, especially with Nolasco pitching well.

The Dodgers also will get a little help on the fringes when rosters expand on Sept. 1.

Was Don Mattingly too lenient on Yasiel Puig when he benched him for only part of one game in Miami, a game in which Puig hit the decisive home run after entering as a defensive replacement? Was he too harsh fining him after Puig got stuck in traffic and showed up late?

Those questions will be debated as the Puig saga unfolds, but it seems Mattingly at least started to take a stand. That should be viewed favorably within the clubhouse.

Grade: B-

CHEMISTRY QUIZ

We saw the first in-house signs of backlash toward Puig last week, with Mattingly fining him and veteran players beginning to express some disappointment with Puig repeating his on-field mistakes. For now, it seems containable, more a headache for Mattingly than a crisis.

The Dodgers’ clubhouse was already trending toward goofy before Wilson arrived. Now, guys seem to be having even more fun before games. Wilson and Uribe have revived their tradition from the San Francisco Giants days of playing dominos before games, with Uribe’s voice often filling the clubhouse with calls of “Wil-son!”

They’re still winning. What's not to like?

Grade: B-

STATE OF CONTENTION

If Dodgers fans are prone to worry, they might think of a team like the 2011 Atlanta Braves, who, on Aug. 23, were in prime position for a deep playoff run, 10 ½ games ahead of the St. Louis Cardinals in the wild-card standings.

From there, Atlanta went 11-21 and failed to make the playoffs, with the Cardinals making one of the most improbable World Series runs in the sport’s history.

Then again, those types of collapses become famous, because they’re so rare. The Dodgers began the week with a 7 ½-game lead and they ended it with a 9 1/2-game lead, so how bad can things be?

Grade: A-

LOS ANGELES -- By the time Zack Greinke walked into Los Angeles Dodgers president Stan Kasten’s office last winter he had a pretty good idea of what he was walking into.

The Dodgers would probably make him the best offer of any of his free-agent suitors, he’d be supported by one of the National League’s most talented lineups, and for as long as he pitched in Chavez Ravine, the new ownership group promised seemingly unlimited financial resources.

What he didn’t count on or, rather, what he couldn’t possibly realize then the importance of, was the effect pitching alongside left-hander Clayton Kershaw would have on him.

“The team looked really good to me,” Greinke said after his latest masterpiece, a nine-strikeout, 6-2 win over the woeful Chicago Cubs Monday night.

“What I didn’t know was how good [Kershaw] was going to be. You knew he was going to be really good, but you didn’t know how good.”

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