If you’re looking for a fill-in ace, that would be Kenta Maeda. He’s been impressive in his first year in MLB. His 7-5 record masks an excellent 2.82 ERA while striking out an above-average 8.64 strikeouts per nine innings thanks to a slider that earns whiffs at a remarkable 22.4 percent rate. In fact, this slider is third in the majors in runs saved at 12.6, trailing only Joe Ross and aforementioned ailing teammate Kershaw.

The other pieces in the rotation come with a little more intrigue. Scott Kazmir has been undeniably shaky over the course of the season (4.37 ERA, 1.27 WHIP), but fanned 10 batters against the Rockies as he pitched six innings of scoreless ball. He has shown these flashes of dominance during the season – including a 12 strikeout effort at the end of May – and it could be the first of a hot streak.

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Brandon McCarthy entered the rotation over the weekend, marking his return from Tommy John surgery and steamrolled through the Rockies using a heavy dosage of curveballs – the pitch generated whiffs at a 16.67 percent rate, the highest mark he’s held in a game with his hook since 2009. While McCarthy can’t be expected to shut out teams routinely, he couldn’t have better timing to show promise on the hill.

Then there’s 19-year-old phenom Julio Urias, who struggled for the first time in five starts on Monday evening. Given the Dodgers’ strong desires to limit his pitches in 2016, it could spell the end of Urias inside the rotation. This would open the door for Brock Stewart, who struck out 20 batters and walked just one in his two most recent Class AAA starts, if Hyun-Jin Ryu wasn’t set this week to pitch in the majors for the first time since 2014. The Dodgers have a few extra options at the back end to help them if further damage comes their way.

But the final member of the Dodgers’ staff is easily the most interesting. Bud Norris was acquired from the Atlanta Braves last Wednesday and is in the midst a renaissance. Norris earned zero wins above replacement rotating between the bullpen and rotation of the Orioles and Braves in 2015 and the 31-year-old’s career seemed to be trending toward and early retirement. Since becoming a starter for the Braves on June 4, however, Norris has been phenomenal to the tune of a 1.78 ERA, 0.91 WHIP, 27.2 percent strikeout rate and just a 6.6 percent walk rate in six starts. How is Norris producing ace-like numbers?

It comes down to one pitch for Norris: his cutter. Norris began shifting his approach by throwing fewer change-ups in favor of a cutter that he only touched sporadically previously in his career.

The results are staggering. Norris has induced whiffs on 23 percent of his cutters, while holding batters to a paltry .080 batting average, making the pitch a defining element of his repertoire. Even better, the pitch has amplified the effectiveness of his fastball, which has steadily increased its whiff rate as well since his cutter’s introduction.

As batters become more acclimated to Norris featuring a cutter, they are more conscious of the late action, shifting their focus from expecting a straight heater. With this extra threat on hitter’s minds, they are having more trouble handling fastballs that are featuring a little more velocity and less movement than his cutter.

To understand this concept fully, take a look at this very situation in motion during an at-bat against the Cubs’ Miguel Montero. The Chicago catcher first whiffs on a cutter, then fails to catch up to Norris’s fastball on the very next pitch located in the same spot.

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Montero was unable to handle the break of Norris’s cutter on strike one, and even though the pitch had the same location, the slight bump in velocity mixed with a different path to the glove was enough of a change to prevent Montero from making contact. It’s a beautiful sequence and encapsulates Norris’s transformation into one of the more underrated pitchers in the majors.

It is never ideal to lose the anchor of your pitching staff, especially when that player is the greatest pitcher in the game. Still, the Dodgers aren’t as helpless as they might seem — with a deep array of pitching talent that should keep them afloat as Kershaw recovers.

All stats courtesy of FanGraphs and Brooks Baseball, all GIFs courtesy of Pitcher List.