Dodgers’ Trea Turner finishes strong to win batting title

LOS ANGELES — Earlier this week, friend and former teammate Juan Soto texted the Dodgers’ Trea Turner to trash talk about the batting race.

“He told me he was coming for me,” Turner said.

Turner had no reason to be looking over his shoulder Sunday afternoon as he punctuated his season with his third home run and second grand slam in the last three games, raising his average to .328 and finishing the season as the MLB leader.

“He’s a guy that just keeps it simple,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “He’s got a lot of humility. He’s tremendously talented. I want to congratulate him on winning a batting title. They don’t give those away. That’s hard to do.”

Turner is the first Dodger to win the batting title since Tommy Davis did it in back-to-back years in 1962 and 1963. Eddie Murray hit .330 for the Dodgers in 1990 but officially lost the National League batting title to Willie McGee, who batted .335 with the St. Louis Cardinals before a late-season trade to the American League.

“Not yet. I’m sure I’ll hear from him shortly,” Turner said when asked if he had received Soto’s concession speech via text after Sunday’s game. “He kind of handed it to me. I thought I was going to have a little bit more pressure this last week or I’d have to put pressure on him. I thought it was going to be more of a race. I’ll ask him what happened.”

What happened is Turner won the race going away. Over a career-high 19-game hitting streak to finish the season (the longest by a Dodger this season), Turner batted .403 (31 for 77).

After batting .322 in 96 games for the Washington Nationals, Turner batted .338 in 52 games as a Dodger, matching his career-high with his 27th home run of the season Sunday.

“For me, it’s consistency, which I pride myself on. Showing up every day,” Turner said of the batting title. “Certain awards you’ve got to qualify for. You have to have a certain number of at-bats and it’s hard to qualify if you’re not out there on the field. That’s part of preparing and part of being lucky. It’s been a good season from a health standpoint.

“Any time you can win anything in this league it’s special. It’s pretty cool and I’m proud of it.”

Turner’s achievement was a bi-coastal batting title. But he didn’t acknowledge the added degree of difficulty that came with continuing to perform after a mid-season trade and position change (from shortstop to second base).

“Focus on one day at a time and one at-bat at a time. Control what you can control,” Turner said. “A lot of things are out of my control and don’t necessarily affect me. If you let your emotions get the best of you one way or the other then it’s going to be a long season. For me, just move on from success and failure. Keep learning and keep having fun. How I approach each day I think is what allowed me to be in this situation.”

Starting pitcher Walker Buehler was campaigning for more honors for Turner.

“I don’t know why Trea isn’t getting spoken about for MVP as much. He’s had an extremely special year. He’s had a year that not a lot of players can have,” Buehler said of Turner, who also led the majors in hits (195) and the National League in stolen bases (32). “We’ve seen it for a couple months now and obviously what he was doing in Washington. He’s a special player and a game-changing player.”

ROSTER MOVE

Before Sunday’s game, the Dodgers added right-hander Andre Jackson to the active roster and optioned right-hander Mitch White who pitched an inning in Saturday’s game.

Jackson made his third big-league appearance Sunday, pitching the final three innings and recording his first career save.

UP NEXT

Wild-card playoff game – Cardinals (RHP Adam Wainwright, 17-7, 3.05 ERA) at Dodgers (RHP Max Scherzer, 15-4, 2.46 ERA), Wednesday, 5:10 p.m., TBS, 570 AM