by Cary Osborne
The back right side of the Dodger clubhouse is adjustment row.
It’s Freddie Freeman and his locker neighbor Michael Conforto.
It’s one player who hit a month-long rough patch and another who has had a bumpy season.
Freeman doubled twice against the Chicago White Sox on Thursday and drove in three runs. He was robbed of a homer in his third at-bat.
Conforto homered against the Sox.
Both have turned corners. Both have said it’s because of … adjustments.
And both of their recent adjustments paid off in the Dodgers’ 6–2 win against the White Sox at Dodger Stadium on Thursday. The Dodgers swept the White Sox over three games and are now 32–10 against sub-.500 teams.
Freeman said he went back to something he used in the 2024 World Series to recalibrate and get his body in a better position to make impactful contact.
“The cue that I’ve been using was the World Series cue and kind of the step-out cue that I’ve been doing,” Freeman said. “It’s about the fourth time I’ve tried this, so the fourth time was a charm.”
Freeman now has consecutive games with multiple hits for the first time since June 2 and 3.
Freeman hit .200 in June. But he is now 7 for his last 16 going back to last Saturday.
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He gave the Dodgers a 3–0 lead with an RBI double in the first inning and a two-run double in the third.
Conforto later followed with a two-run homer in the third to give the Dodgers a 5–0 lead.
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He is 7-for-25 (.280) with three home runs and eight RBI over his last six games.
The veteran outfielder had four home runs, 13 RBI and batted .165 over his first 68 games.
“It’s something I had to be patient with for sure,” Conforto said of the adjustments he made. “We’ve made some adjustments along the way during the season. This is kind of the most drastic one that we’ve made. One common thing was that I was just getting blocked off a little bit, and I was a little bit late. I can’t remember when exactly we made the switch, but just opening up my stance and just getting moving a little bit earlier has seemed to do a lot of good things and cleaned up a lot of the mechanical stuff for me.”
Speaking of changes, Dodger starter Dustin May was landing strikes at his best rate of the season.
May took a perfect game into the sixth inning. He tied a career high with seven innings pitched and pitched into the eighth inning for the first time in his career. He was also one strikeout away from tying a career high in strikeouts. He had nine.
But May was clearly upset with himself in the eighth inning when he allowed a two-run home run to Chicago center fielder Brooks Baldwin.
The homer ended May’s night.
Baldwin also ended the perfect game with a one-out single in the sixth inning.
Otherwise, it was a sterling night for the right-hander. He earned 14 of his 21 outs on three pitches or fewer. He threw a season-best 71% strikes.
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He was at 54.8% in his last start against Kansas City last Friday.
It was a get-well game for one other Dodger as well.
Mookie Betts hit a solo home run in the seventh inning — his first homer since June 8.
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Changes have Freeman and Conforto turning a corner was originally published in Dodger Insider on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.