This is Part 29 of a series in which every member of the 2015 Dodgers has his season juxtaposed with an episode of the greatest sitcom of all-time. Don’t take it too seriously.

Mat Latos, RHP

Key stats: 0-3, 6.66 earned-run average in six games (five starts)

Seinfeld episode: “The Watch” (Season 4, Episode 6)

Key quote: “Look, I happen to know how much that watch cost. It’s a sixty
dollar watch, you paid forty to get it fixed. That’s a hundred dollars. I’m
offering you two hundred!”

Latos rode into town on a banana and a Red Bull, and in hindsight maybe that should’ve been a clue that he didn’t possess the same degree of discipline as, say, Clayton Kershaw.

The Dodgers didn’t need Latos to be Kershaw when they acquired him from the Marlins in July. They needed someone who could be a solid third starter behind Kershaw and Zack Greinke in the postseason. The front office at least had some reason to believe Latos could be that pitcher when he became a Dodger along with Alex Wood, Jim Johnson, Luis Avilan and Jose Peraza in exchange for Hector Olivera, Paco Rodriguez and prospects.

When the season began, Latos struggled mightily. He was 1-4 with a 6.12 earned-run average after his first nine starts in a Marlins uniform. Then he went on the 15-day disabled list May 22 with inflammation in his left knee.

Latos returned a new pitcher. He had a 2.96 ERA and a 43-to-9 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 45 ⅔ innings over his next seven starts. It was those seven starts that Andrew Friedman and company pointed to when defending the acquisition. The need to defend the trade was constant. Almost as soon as he became a Dodger, Latos’ streak of good luck vanished to the point that only verbal reminders bore evidence to his dominance.

Latos was given five starts before he being booted from the starting rotation. In those five games, Latos pitched fewer than five innings and allowed more than three runs on average. Rather than a serviceable playoff starter, Latos ended his Dodger career as an unserviceable 16th-inning relief option. On Sept. 15, the Rockies scored a run against Latos to end a 5-4 game five hours and 23 minutes after it started … in the 16th inning. He was subsequently designated for assignment and finished the season with the Angels (as a reliever).

It’s fun to second-guess the trade from the Dodgers’ standpoint, but it’s unfair to judge Latos against the other pitchers who were traded this summer (David Price, Mike Leake, Cole Hamels, etc.). The asking price for those pitchers isn’t known, and Latos was only one of six players the Dodgers acquired. Still, Latos failed miserably. As far as 2015 was concerned, the trade couldn’t have worked out much worse for the Dodgers.

Speaking of bad trades … In “The Watch,” Jerry is given a watch as a gift from his father, then throws it in a trash can on the street because it doesn’t work. Jerry’s Uncle Leo picks the watch out of the trash, takes it to a repair shop, gets it fixed in a day, and wears it out to dinner with Jerry and his father. In the restaurant bathroom, Jerry ends up buying the watch from Uncle Leo for $350.

Uncle Leo knows a good deal when he sees one: