CHICAGO — Dave Roberts wanted to cut the tension amid the worst stretch of the Los Angeles Dodgers’ season. He had yet to sit down for his pregame session with reporters Wednesday before cautioning against panic.“The sun came up today,” Roberts said with a chuckle before looking up at an overcast morning at Wrigley Field.Then the Dodgers went out and lost 7-6 to the Chicago Cubs. It was their sixth defeat in a row, and Los Angeles is winless since winning the deadline with the acquisition of Tarik Skubal. This is the longest losing streak of the season for the back-to-back World Series champions.Add in that their first baseman and hottest hitter spent some of the afternoon in the X-ray room, and it becomes a little more difficult to find the sun. Freddie Freeman was hit on the side of his right hand when he got jammed on a foul ball in the fifth inning, causing it to swell. Roberts took him out of the game after the at-bat ended with a flyout.“That’s what I get for swinging at a ball at my face,” Freeman said.X-rays on Freeman’s hand were negative. Freeman expects to be back in the lineup Friday against the Arizona Diamondbacks. The Dodgers need him.They have not played well. The Boston Red Sox whooped them for three games at Dodger Stadium, including on “Sunday Night Baseball.” After boarding for a red-eye flight to Chicago, the Cubs outplayed them, too.“We do need to put it together,” Freeman said. “It’s what, 50 games left? We all want to play better.”Last year’s Dodgers lost seven consecutive games in July. Before that, they hadn’t lost more than five in a row since April 2019. The last 47 games of the regular season are plenty of time to get right.“It’s easier when you look around our clubhouse,” Freeman said. “We’re going to be fine. We just got a really good team. It’s a 162-game schedule. We’re going to go through it at some points.”Some more things I think:This deadline showed one way the Dodgers build equity with playersAny conversation between a front office executive and a player this time of year usually means a trade is brewing and, in the case of Alex Call and Eric Lauer, it was hard to ignore the possibility.But Monday’s deadline passed. Both are still Dodgers. They knew their names bandied in trade talks. They knew that, in part, because Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman spoke individually with Call and Lauer to lay out the stakes. The Dodgers listened in trade talks for both players but did not execute a move. Still, Friedman wanted to let them have a heads-up.“It’s very rare,” Lauer said, to have that kind of transparency.Such openness, in turn, reinforced how Lauer was feeling. The pitcher wanted to stay. Now he’s appreciative that he will.Lauer started Wednesday against the Cubs and allowed six runs in four innings. The Dodgers acquired him as a short-term fill-in after he was designated for assignment by the Toronto Blue Jays. In Los Angeles, Lauer exceeded every expectation and even made himself into a trade candidate. He entered this deadline with a 2.96 ERA in 51 2/3 innings as a Dodger. The team did not lose any of the first nine times he pitched.Lauer’s time in the rotation was limited, no matter how Wednesday went. Blake Snell is expected to rejoin the rotation next week, Roberts said.As part of Lauer’s conversation with Friedman, the executive explained that Lauer might shift to long relief. Lauer could’ve had starting roles elsewhere if the Dodgers traded him. Friedman wanted to know how comfortable Lauer was with that.“We talked through every possible scenario and got my comfortability level with it, their comfortability with it,” Lauer said. “It all just kind of lined up.”The Dodgers explored deals for Call because he represented a rarity in a seller’s market. Several contenders were seeking right-handed hitting outfielders. There weren’t many available.