The 2011 season hasn’t provided too many positive memories for Los Angeles Dodgers fans, but that doesn’t mean the ones it has provided can’t be extremely satisfying.

Take the incredible success of Clayton Kershaw(notes) for example. Kershaw is currently enjoying the best season by a Dodgers starter in over 20 years. He further cemented that on Tuesday night, tossing 7 1/3 innings of one-run ball while leading Los Angeles to a 2-1 victory over the San Francisco Giants. With the win, Kershaw became the team’s first 20-game winner since Ramon Martinez(notes) in 1990.

I would imagine that’s very satisfying to witness. But going beyond that, it’s the fact Kershaw has achieved a good deal of that success against their arch-rivals that likely has Dodgers fans doing cartwheels — or at least staying off the ledge — at the tail end of this lost season.

How good has Kershaw been against the defending World Series champs? With the victory Tuesday night, the 23-year-old lefty improves to 5-0 with a 1.07 ERA in five starts this season. Not even Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale or Fernando Valenzuela can lay claim to a 5-0 record over the Giants in a given year. In fact, you have to go all the way back to Vic Lombardi — who would have turned 89 on Tuesday — in 1946 to find the last time it happened.

On top of that, in four head-to-head matchups with two-time Cy Young winner Tim Lincecum(notes), Kershaw has gone 4-0 and only allowed one earned run in 30 1/3 innings.

Fully acknowledging the shortcomings of the San Francisco Giants offense, those are still pretty crazy ridiculous numbers. And assuming the Giants fail to make the postseason, they can look back at their inability to solve Kershaw as one of the main reasons why.

Knowing this, Los Angeles reporters decided to ask Kershaw for his thoughts on contributing to San Francisco’s current predicament, to which he deadpanned a very short response.

“It’s a shame.”

That’s enough to make a Giants fans’ stomach churn.

As is the following question: With 20 wins under his belt, and remarkable success against the defending world champions on his résumé, has Clayton Kershaw done enough to unseat Roy Halladay(notes) and hold off the competition from Cliff Lee(notes) and Ian Kennedy(notes) in the National League Cy Young race?

Personally, Kershaw had my vote at the beginning of the season, and he has my vote now.

There’s no denying Kershaw put an impressive stamp on his candidacy Tuesday night with an outing so dominant, center fielder Matt Kemp(notes) had time to debate the Cy Young with himself while standing around in the outfield.

“If this boy doesn’t win the Cy Young, something’s definitely wrong,” Kemp recalled saying to himself.

Honestly, I couldn’t think of a more ringing endorsement than that.

Related: Clayton Kershaw, Ian Kennedy, Tim Lincecum, Matt Kemp, Cliff Lee, Ramon Martinez, Roy Halladay, Los Angeles Dodgers, San Francisco Giants

That’s all for today guys, i’ll be back to blog you tomorrow.

MIDLAND – Former Los Angeles Dodgers catcher Steve Yeager will make a special visit to Dow Diamond on Tuesday as part of the Great Lakes Loons’ Dodgers Route of Champions Night promotion.

Yeager played for the Dodgers for 14 seasons, 15 overall in the Majors. He hit .228 with 816 hits, 357 runs, 118 doubles, 102 homers and 410 RBIs.

There is the quick update of the day.

Jhoulys Chacin is feeling the heat in the fourth inning, when the Dodgers scored three runs after an error by Ty Wigginton in the outfield.
( Jason Redmond, The Associated Press
)

LOS ANGELES — Meetings are for losers. It’s not an opinion, but fact. The worse a team does, the more it gathers behind closed doors. Manager Jim Tracy held his third team meeting Tuesday, the club’s fifth this season.

What made this one different was the message. There was no fire and brimstone. Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing” wasn’t playing in the background. There was only disappointment. The Rockies have spent the past two weeks embarrassing themselves and were challenged to finish with pride, regardless of the standings.

They promptly fell 3-2 to the Dodgers on Tuesday night before 50,664 fans drawn to the stadium by Fernando Valenzuela bobbleheads.

It has been a difficult stretch — eight losses in 11 games. The Rockies are unable to glance at the clubhouse TV without seeing a player in trade rumors, namely ace Ubaldo Jimenez. He seems to be growing weary of the talk, and barely managed a grin Tuesday when a teammate asked him jokingly why he was still here.

“It’s a business,” Jimenez said. “I have to go out and do my job. I know whatever happens, I will be pitching somewhere.”

Added shortstop Troy Tulowitzki: “Without a doubt, it can be a distraction. But I made up my mind a long time ago that I was going to play the game the same way every day whether we are 20 ahead or 20 back. You have the whole offseason to shut it down.”

The Rockies’ effort was fine, but the execution — all together now — was flawed. They continue to find creative ways to reach defeat. They didn’t hit with runners in scoring position (1-for-12), made critical defensive mistakes and wasted a strong performance by Jhoulys Chacin.

Scoreless after three innings with Clayton Kershaw pitching well, the Rockies’ outfielders put on a display that will never appear in a Tom Emanskivideo. All it took was a dropped popup and a collision by the Rockies to shove the Dodgers ahead 3-0.

Rafael Furcal hit a routine

fly to left fielder Ty Wigginton. He one-handed the ball and watched it deflect off his glove. A few moments later, Mark Ellis raced back and caught a popup as he slammed into right fielder Ryan Spilborghs. What should have been a can of corn instead opened a can of worms, allowing a run to score on the suspect sacrifice fly.

Though the Rockies lost the sixth straight game he has started, Chacin finished with a decent line, allowing one earned run in six innings. Kershaw was vulnerable. But with the runners at second and third in the first inning, he escaped by getting Tulowitzki to pop up and Wiggington to strike out.

The Rockies’ runs came on Todd Helton’s fifth-inning single and his seventh-inning groundout. Tulowitzki had a chance to knot the score in the seventh, but he tapped out, literally. His slow roller in front off the plate off Matt Guerrier was an easy out for catcher Dioner Navarro.

Troy E. Renck: 303-954-1301 or trenck@denverpost.com

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Looking ahead

WEDNESDAY: Rockies at Dodgers, 8:10 p.m., Root

Aaron Cook (1-5, 5.84 ERA) won for the first time since September, a testament to his bat — see RBI single — as much as his pitches. Helped by a season-high five runs of support, the right-hander grinded through a victory over Arizona. He beat the Dodgers in his only start against them last year, and is 6-7 in 22 career games against L.A. Andre Ethier has nine hits off Cook, including two HRs. Hiroki Kuroda (6-12, 3.19) isn’t starting, he’s auditioning. The Yankees, Red Sox and Tigers are interested — if he’ll waive his no-trade clause. Seth Smith is 6-for-14, two RBIs against Kuroda. Troy E. Renck, The Denver Post

Upcoming pitching matchups

Thursday: Off

Friday: Rockies’ Jason Hammel (5-10, 4.75 ERA) at Padres’ Tim Stauffer (6-7, 3.05), 8:05 p.m., Root

Saturday: Rockies’ Ubaldo Jimenez (6-9, 4.20) at Padres’ Aaron Harang (9-2, 3.45), 6:35 p.m., Root

Sunday: Rockies’ Juan Nicasio (4-3, 4.24) at Padres’ Dustin Moseley (3-10, 3.30), 2:05 p.m., Root

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NORTHRIDGE, Calif. — Frank McCourt said he wouldn’t change a thing about his seven years as owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers and remains confident, despite his recent legal setbacks, that he will be able to retain ownership of the team once his divorce from former wife Jamie McCourt is settled.

“No. I wouldn’t do anything differently,” McCourt said Tuesday, his first public comments since L.A. Superior Court Judge Scott Gordon granted Jamie McCourt’s request to throw out the post-nuptial marital property agreement that would’ve given Frank McCourt sole ownership of the team.

“We’re just going to go through that process. And I’m very, very confident, at the end of the process, I’m going to own the baseball team and someday my four kids are. My confidence in that has not changed a bit, based on what we’ve gone through. That’s how I continue to proceed on a daily basis.”

McCourt addressed a small group of reporters after the dedication of the tenth Dodgers Dream field Tuesday in Northridge, a suburb in the San Fernando Valley about 20 miles north of downtown.

He declined comment at baseball’s quarterly owners meetings in Arizona last month and all subsequent interview requests.

McCourt said Tuesday that nothing about the day-to-day operations of the team has changed since Gordon’s ruling.

“No. Not at all,” said McCourt, who has also been acting as the team’s president since Dennis Mannion left in October. “If anything I’ve redoubled my efforts to bring a winner to L.A. That’s how I spend my days.”

McCourt arrived to the field in Northridge about 30 minutes late and left soon after the dedication ceremony. He said he intended to fly to the team’s spring training facility at Camelback Ranch in Glendale, Ariz., on Wednesday.

Events like Tuesday’s field dedication, the last stop on the team’s annual community service caravan, are, “what I personally find most joyful and fulfilling,” he said.

McCourt said he was optimistic about the Dodgers prospects for the 2011 season.

“I think we made some of the improvements we needed to make in the offseason and I’m very, very excited about the team and its prospects,” he said. “I’m looking forward to seeing how they come together in spring training.”

Asked if he understood the concern of Dodger fans over the team’s future, with the ownership and financial situation so unsettled, McCourt maintained that fans should judge him and the team by its performance.

“The fans care about one thing and that’s the team winning,” he said. “They want to talk about the players and our pitching and who is going to bat cleanup. That’s really what fans care about.

“That’s what they want, like all of us, and that’s what I want to deliver to the fans is a world championship.”

Ramona Shelburne is a columnist and reporter for ESPNLosAngeles.com.

Follow Ramona Shelburne on Twitter: @ramonashelburne

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