Dodgers Take Two in San Diego and are the Best in the West
I don't know if one team made a statement or not, but the Dodgers rebounded from an embarrassing loss Monday by winning Tuesday and Wednesday at San Diego. They leave town with a satisfying series win and the season-series win, with six victories to the Padres' four.
Los Angeles is 35-15, holds a 3 1/2 game lead in the National League West with 10 to play (four in the loss column) and heads to Colorado for four beginning Thursday night at Coors Field (Julio Urias versus Kyle Freeland at 5.40 p.m. PT on SportsNet LA).
The Dodgers are the best in the West. For the moment. But they're not getting ahead of themselves and neither should anyone else in two or more NL cities.
Highlights from this afternoon's 7-5 L.A. win are as follows:
In what I think was a bit of gamesmanship on skipper Dave Roberts' part, Brusdar Graterol started in place of Dustin May and looked strong in getting four outs on 15 pitches. He left with a man on base his responsibility, which Adam Kolarek allowed to score. These things happen.
May followed Kolarek and went 5 1/3 innings — the longest relief outing of his career — allowing an earned run on three hits, with a walk and six strikeouts, lowering his 2020 ERA to 2.68. If there were any after-effects of last week's foot contusion, they weren't readily apparent.
Mookie Betts went 2-for-5 to raise his batting average to .306 and his OPS to .978, separating himself some from Fernando Tatis Jr. in the NL MVP race. San Diego's star shortstop went 0-for-4 and is 2-for-25 (.080) in the last week plus today.
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Max Muncy had a big two-out double to plate a run in the third and Cody Bellinger contributed a two-out single for another in the fifth. Good signs for those guys.
AJ Pollock homered in the second, his 11th; Chris Taylor homered in the sixth, his sixth. Will Smith ripped a clutch two-out, two-run double in L.A.'s three-run fifth, added a single later and has his average up to .310, with a 1.034 OPS, to lead the club. Pedro Baez got a shot at a save and recorded it, retiring the final two outs in the ninth.
And oh, by the way, with the win over the second-place Padres, the Dodgers clinched a playoff spot; the first team in baseball to do so. As you might expect, Roberts wasn't overly impressed by that, but is proud of his men all the same (see video above).
The Friars' faithful were predictably provoked, miffed and shall we say, impolite, by the sight of my tweet below, but that's fine. I can take the heat, even if isn't particularly clever.
Notes:
1. Joc Pederson was placed on the family emergency list prior to the game and we will keep a good thought in mind for the Pedersons. Zach McKinstry was recalled, made his major league debut in a ninth-inning pinch hitting role and struck out.
2. Caleb Ferguson was placed on the IL with what appears to be a torn ulnar collateral ligament, which usually leads to Tommy John surgery. Joe Kelly was activated from the suspension list this morning. And Josh Sborz was recalled from the team's alternate site at USC.
3. By virtue of its season series win, Los Angeles holds the tiebreaker with San Diego. So if the teams were to finish with the same record after 60 games, the Dodgers will win their eighth straight division title.
And remember, glove conquers all.
Howard Cole has been writing about baseball on the internet since Y2K. Follow him on Twitter.
Video courtesy of Spectrum SportsNetLA/Los Angeles Dodgers.
