Cody Bellinger slipped through the netting of a Camelback Ranch batting cage and gazed at a pitching machine. Dodgers hitting coach Turner Ward manned the contraption, which dolloped late spin onto each offering. Bellinger slashed a pair of line drives before whacking a few foul and others into the ground. "That's a big-league knock," third baseman Justin Turner crowed after Bellinger pounded one into the green turf.
Bellinger shook his head and looked sheepish. A year earlier, he had been a 21-year-old swimming upstream at his second round of big-league spring training. He spent 2017 as the toast of Los Angeles, swatting home runs and pounding ice cream as the cleanup hitter for the pennant winner.