Dodgers mailbag: What happened to the offense? Should we worry about Scott Kazmir?

The Dodgers are 13-13. That’s a pace for, you guessed it, 81 wins. Now how did this team go from a 102-win clip last week to a .500 record? That’s what one brutal week in April will do to you.

On Sunday, the Dodgers avoided a seven-game losing streak thanks to Clayton Kershaw, a veritable one-man army. Even with Kershaw’s shutout, the team still went 1-6 on the homestand. The group returns to action on Tuesday night in Tampa Bay.

Until then, there are plenty of questions to answer. If you have one in the future, you can reach me on Twitter @McCulloughTimes.

Man. What a brutal week for the Dodgers. The offense did not just crater. It vanished. The team scored 12 runs in seven games. And they were not exactly facing the Cubs (who boast Jake Arrieta, Jon Lester and John Lackey) or the Mets (Noah Syndergaard, Matt Harvey and Jacob DeGrom) or the Pirates (Gerritt Cole, Francisco Liriano and whichever journeyman Ray Searage turned into a No. 3 starter this year).

No, they were facing the Marlins and the Padres. The team went through the ritual cap-tipping to Jose Fernandez and Drew Pomeranz, but the club was also stymied by the likes of Justin Nicolino, Colin Rea and Cesar Vargas.

Adrian Gonzalez went hitless on the homestand. Yasiel Puig recorded only two hits and did not show much patience. Justin Turner has yet to regain the form he flashed in 2014 and 2015. Howie Kendrick is hitting .143 and he went the entire month without an extra-base hit.

That is an unsightly statistical stew. The Dodgers have reason to believe their veterans will snap out of the funk. Gonzalez is the consummate, consistent professional. Puig still possesses an enviable amount of talent. Kendrick has made his living hitting about .290 every year for a decade. Turner led the team in on-base plus slugging percentage and looked like an All-Star during spring training,

But the team needs more offensive production. Obviously, of course, but given the inconsistency of the bullpen, this group is not built to capture many 2-1 or 3-2 games. At least, not until the relievers find some balance.

They would probably have two or three more victories, at least, if Kelvin Herrera (or a reasonable equivalent) entered the season as the set-up man to Kenley Jansen. This is not necessarily to pick on Chris Hatcher, who was certainly not trying to post an 8.18 ERA in April, but rather to reinforce the importance of quality relievers for high-leverage spots.

The website FanGraphs developed a metric to evaluate relievers based on Win Probability Added (WPA). If a reliever achieves greater than a 0.06 WPA in a game, he receives credit for a Shutdown. If a reliever achieves worse than a -0.06 WPA, he receives credit for a Meltdown. The Shutdown/Meltdown meaning should be self-explanatory, but it does highlight how a reliever can alter the course of the game.

In April, Hatcher led the National League with five meltdowns. That’s five games where his negative performance made a significant difference in the outcome of the game. He also ranked last among National League relievers with a -1.13 WPA.

Again: We do not intend to bury Hatcher. The front office placed him in this position of high leverage. And, in April at least, he did not prove up to the job.

For the Dodgers, the task ahead is not about spreading blame, but about finding someone who can handle the eighth inning. Hatcher has lost that job. It will be split between Pedro Baez and Joe Blanton for the foreseeable future.

It’s still too small a sample size, but the early troubles for Scott Kazmir can’t be dismissed outright. He has made five starts. The first was good; the last was decent. In between, he got bashed for 14 runs in 13 innings. He also admitted he is dealing with soreness in his left wrist/thumb wrought by hitting.

So which version will the Dodgers see on Tuesday in Tampa Bay? We should know more then. In those three rough outings, he faced the Giants twice and pitched the other game at Coors Field. San Francisco has one of the better lineups in baseball, and games in Colorado can be bonkers. So let’s see how he handles Tuesday. That could be interesting.

For the most part, Dave Roberts has behaved in an orthodox fashion. He had some blips early in the season when, on multiple occasions, he sent relievers into untidy situations and saw the relievers falter. But for the most part, he has made sensible decisions. His bullpen has just been too unreliable.

For one thing, it will take more than Julio Urias to acquire Sonny Gray. It will likely take significantly more, especially if Gray is the lone front-line starter available on the trade market this summer. The Marlins may dangle Jose Fernandez, but it’s hard to predict if he’ll actually be available. If the White Sox keep winning, it’s impossible to acquire Chris Sale.

So there will be plenty of clubs dialing up David Forst and Billy Beane in pursuit of Gray. The argument for dealing Urias despite his age and his ceiling is it’s unclear when he will actually be contributing at the big-league level. He has been handled gently in the minors, out of caution, so it’s hard to project him making an immediate impact in the majors.

These are difficult questions. That’s why they pay Andrew Friedman (and Farhan Zaidi and Josh Byrnes and Alex Anthopoulos and ... ) the big bucks.

The Dodgers left Jose De Leon at the complex at Camelback Ranch to restrict his innings. The team planned to do this with several other young pitchers, but De Leon drew the first straw, so he stayed back. But he tweeted his arrival in Oklahoma City on Sunday afternoon, and is expected to join their rotation shortly.

De Leon, a 23-year-old right-hander, threw 114 1/3 innings last season between Class A Rancho Cucamonga and double-A Tulsa. During three seasons at Southern University, he threw 221 innings total. So his arm has not been stretched to a 150-inning threshold just yet, and the team wanted to put him in a position to potentially contribute later in the season.

Not particularly. I had a great two years in Kansas City, in a professional sense, but the weather is much nicer in California and there are a lot more rock shows. And people care less about barbecue, which is a welcome change.

This is what I mean.

Dolph Ziggler belongs on the midcard. I’m not crazy about Baron Corbin, but I’m perfectly fine with Ziggler being used like this to break in green guys from NXT. Ziggler can bump like crazy and he can generally work a solid match that lasts about eight to 10 minutes. But his work on the mike doesn’t draw money, and his personality lacks a compelling hook.

As Jim Ross would say, “He’s a good hand,” but I’m not sure he serves much purpose other than being a high-quality mechanic and a gatekeeper. And those Ziggler-ites will always have this night.

I hope it’s “She Came Home for Christmas” by Mew.

Andy.mccullough@latimes.com

Twitter: @McCulloughTimes