[mlbvideo id=”236721683″ width=”550″ height=”308″ /]

By Jon Weisman

This has certainly not been the easiest of Jimmy Rollins’ 16 Major League seasons, but his perseverance through the Dodgers’ 10-7 victory Monday against his former team, Philadelphia, was a welcome harbinger for the second half of 2015.

A 10-pitch at-bat in the second inning ended frustratingly with a liner to Ryan Howard. A nine-pitch at-bat in the fourth that included four foul balls ended in a pop out.

But an eight-pitch at-bat in the sixth culminated in a single off Phillies southpaw Sean O’Sullivan the opposite way to right field. And in the seventh inning, this time batting from the left side against reliever Jeanmar Gomez — on the 29th pitch Rollins had seen in the game — he again went the opposite way, breaking a 7-7 tie with what proved to be a game-winning, two-run single.

“I’ve been working on hitting the ball the other way,” Rollins said. “It’s a new swing, so it has its ups and downs, but tonight on the last hit, it worked out for me. It was a sinkerball pitcher, and I wasn’t going to try to pull him — that’s a recipe for disaster. He left the ball up, and I seen Freddy (Galvis) playing more toward the middle and that hole was open, and my intent was to hit it right there. And it worked out.

Rollins said there was no extra incentive to succeed against Philadelphia, but later conceded that there perhaps was some not to fail.

“When you get a hit like that it feels good, no matter who you’re playing against,” Rollins said. “If you don’t, it’s like, ‘Dammit.’ And I definitely didn’t want to have a ‘dammit’ moment against my former team.”

Watching from the dugout next to hitting coach Mark McGwire, Dodger manager Don Mattingly saw the poetry in the play.

“‘It’s only fitting that Jimmy’s the guy up right now,’ ” Mattingly said he remembered saying to McGwire. “It was really nice to see him (deliver). He swung the bat good all night, actually.”

That praise is nothing new for Mattingly, who has long maintained Rollins has been hitting in tough luck. And he says Rollins’ defense and clubhouse presence have been positives all season.

“I just think he’s given us that guy in the middle of the field,” Mattingly said. “We’ve been a pretty good defensive club. … All those guys up the middle, it changes our dynamic as far as the kind of club we are.

“One of the things you don’t see with Jimmy, sometimes he’s walking to the mound during the inning, just to slow something down, or there are conversations he’s having that I don’t even know about, even in some of our times when we weren’t playing as well as we’ve liked. Jimmy’s always a good voice, because he’s won a championship. He’s the guy who’s been through a lot, and he’s played a long time and he’s willing to speak up. His voice … is a voice when it needs to be there.”

Tonight was one of those nights, when the Dodgers seemed to be pitching uphill from the first inning.

“I don’t know much about pitching,” Rollins said. “I know about hitting. I may communicate something about hitters’ mentality or maybe where you should pitch this guy, just because I might know the hitters. … Sometimes I go up there just to give ’em a break. They get in that rhythm, and just to break that rhythm and get them to focus and get it in.”

Told of Mattingly’s words, Rollins said, “That’s good. That means I’m doing my job.”

In his career, Rollins has a .761 OPS in July and a .782 OPS after the All-Star Break — each of those numbers about 50 points higher than the months prior. The Dodgers hope, as was the case tonight, the “good things come to those who wait” pattern holds.

“That’s just been how it’s been,” Rollins said. “You put me in situations when it counts, I’ve had the knack to get things done.”