LOS ANGELES -- Momentum is only as good as the next day’s starting pitcher. At least that’s what the old baseball adage has claimed for decades.

That was good news for a Dodgers team that is desperately searching for consistency and momentum to start the season. Ace Julio Urías was on the bump and gave the Dodgers a chance to build off an important walk-off win on Saturday.

But it was a lack of offense that doomed the Dodgers once again in the 3-2 loss to the Cubs on Sunday at Dodger Stadium. The Dodgers are 8-8 through 16 games. Last year, they didn’t lose their eighth game of the season until May 9th.

“It’s [16] games in, that’s not fair for a comparison between this year and last year,” said Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman. “I feel like we haven’t got going. When we pitch we don’t hit. When we hit we don’t pitch. It’s just been kind of all over the place the first two weeks. We’ve got six more months.”

The Dodgers got on the board early on a Chris Taylor solo homer in the third inning. For a while, with how effective Urías was looking on the mound, it looked like maybe that would be enough for the Dodgers.

Chicago, however, was able to get to Urías, with some help from a subpar effort by the Los Angeles defense. Miguel Vargas committed an error in the fifth inning that ultimately cost the Dodgers a run on a Luis Torrens RBI infield single.

In the sixth, Patrick Wisdom and Cody Bellinger hit back-to-back homers off Urías, ultimately ending his day after allowing three runs (two earned) and striking out six over 5 2/3 innings of work.

“I thought Julio threw the heck out of the baseball. He really did,” said Dodgers manager Dave Roberts. “If you look at today, we gave them more than 27 outs, and as a result Julio couldn’t go deeper, and you got to use different pitchers and they score runs that might not have scored. So that’s baseball, and we just got to keep getting better.”

For years, the Dodgers have been one of the best defensive teams in the league. This season, however, they’re showing more cracks than usual. Those mistakes are magnified when you consider the offensive inconsistencies. 

The Dodgers had some legitimate beef with the strike zone in the ninth inning, but they acknowledged it wasn’t the reason they dropped two of three this weekend. Los Angeles only scored six runs in the three-game series against the Cubs and were one clutch David Peralta walk-off single away from being swept at home.  

Right now the Dodgers have a handful of players still working through it at the plate, none more notable than Freeman and Mookie Betts. Freeman had his most uncharacteristic game as a Dodger on Sunday, striking out four times in a game for the first time since joining the organization last season. 

“Yeah, he’s out there every day. He’s doing his thing. He’s competing and preparing. But he looks a little out of sorts,” Roberts said. “With him, you take it for granted that he’s going to be locked in every night, but he’s not a robot.”

With Will Smith now on the seven-day injured list with concussion symptoms, the Dodgers are down perhaps their most consistent hitter for an unknown amount of time. That puts more pressure on a struggling lineup and stars like Freeman and Betts to carry the extra load in the star catcher’s absence.

Though the Dodgers still have six months to figure it out, as Freeman said, the margin for error does appear to be thinner than that of the team that won a franchise record 111 games last season.

Despite the subtractions from last season’s roster, the Dodgers have maintained their belief that they have enough firepower to still put together a special season. But they’re still searching for answers through 16 games.

“There’s times where we look really good and put up big numbers and crooked numbers,” Roberts said. “And there are other times when there’s a lot of quick ABs, a lot of weak contact. So when you do that, you’re not going to score many runs.”