Easler to be instructor in minors

Hitting coach Mike Easler, who will be replaced by Don Mattingly at the All-Star break, will be a roving hitting instructor in the Dodgers’ minor league system.

Easler will remain with the major league club through Sunday, and Mattingly will take over when the Dodgers start the second half of their season July 18 in Arizona.

Easler was told of his fate after the game Tuesday night by Manager Joe Torre and General Manager Ned Colletti.

“It doesn’t feel good,” Easler said, “but it’s not a surprise. . . . A manager has to have somebody he’s comfortable with. I totally respect that. If I manage one day, I’ll probably have somebody I’m comfortable with.”

When Torre was hired to manage the Dodgers in November, he took the job on the condition that he could bring Mattingly and third base coach Larry Bowa with him from his staff with the New York Yankees.

Though the Dodgers rank in the bottom five in the league in runs, hits, home runs, walks and slugging percentage, Torre said the reassigning of Easler wasn’t performance-based, but simply a function of Mattingly’s being available.

“I don’t think you can blame anyone for that,” Torre said of the Dodgers’ offensive problems. Referring to the Dodgers’ young lineup, he added, “You can blame that on experience.”

Mattingly was signed to be the hitting coach in the winter but resigned in January because of an impending divorce. He remained with the club as a special assignment coach. Torre and Easler said it was always understood that Mattingly would become the hitting coach once he put his personal problems behind him.

Mattingly made the decision to return “a couple of weeks ago,” Torre said. The manager said he didn’t plan to tell Easler about the move until after the game on Sunday but was forced to do so early because he learned the story would be reported in the Wednesday edition of The Times.

Kuroda feeling fine

The first time Hiroki Kuroda pitched a shutout, he was hit hard in his next start and landed on the disabled list. But after his bullpen session on Wednesday -- his first after his one-hit shutout of the Atlanta Braves on Monday -- the 33-year old right-hander said he was convinced he wouldn’t be hurt again.

“It’s not like it came from one game,” Kuroda said of the shoulder stiffness that landed him on the disabled list on June 19.

Kuroda said that he continues to do the shoulder exercises he did while rehabilitating and that he takes medication to treat his tendinitis almost daily.

Short hops

Late Dodgers owner Walter O’Malley, who moved the Dodgers to Los Angeles from Brooklyn in 1958, was honored by the Los Angeles Coliseum Commission, which unveiled a bronze plaque of him in the Coliseum Court of Honor. O’Malley will be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame on July 27.

Jason Schmidt gave up three runs (two earned) in his minor league rehabilitation start with triple-A Las Vegas on Tuesday night. He made 59 pitches. “He was pleased, which is tough for him,” Torre said of the perfectionist pitcher. . . . Pinch-hitting specialist Mark Sweeney left for Las Vegas to start a rehab assignment with the Dodgers’ triple-A affiliate today. Sweeney will play through the weekend, alternating starts as the designated hitter and first baseman. . . . Injured pitcher Brad Penny is scheduled to play catch today. . . . Nomar Garciaparra, who started his third consecutive game Wednesday, will rest today. Torre said he expected him to be in the lineup for the rest of the week.

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dylan.hernandez@latimes.com