Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
After last night’s blowout win for the Yankees over the Dodgers, people were melting down like they lost a playoff game, so thankfully people can celebrate like they won the World Series after today’s 2-1 victory.
Or they could be reasonable about it.
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The Dodgers started the scoring in the 3rd with Tony Gonsolin singling off CC Sabathia‘s calf and Justin Turner following with a two-run shot to make it 2-0, his 23rd of the year.
Aaron Judge responded in the 4th, blasting a home run to start the inning off Gonsolin to cut the lead in half to 2-1. However, that was all Gonsolin gave up in five stellar innings against a powerful Yankees lineup. Aside from the homer, he allowed just a single and two walks, striking out two batters.
Joe Kelly then stepped in for Gonsolin in the 6th and promptly got a 1-2-3 frame with a strikeout. He also continued in the 7th, which was considerably more difficult. He notched another strikeout among his two outs, but also surrendered a single and a walk before he was relieved by Pedro Baez. Petey got a ground out to escape the frame and then continued on in the 8th, and all he did was strikeout the side.
Once again, the bridge to Kenley Jansen held up and once again Kenley took the ball in the 9th, this time against the heart of the Yankees order. Things started well after he notched a strikeout with consecutive bunt attempts foul by Didi Gregorius, but he then surrendered a single on a grounder against the shift, an infield single off Matt Beaty‘s glove, and the bases were loaded after JT went to second on a routine grounder and Brett Gardner beat it out.
Thankfully Kenley rebounded with dramatic back-to-back strikeouts to secure the save.
Winner winner.
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The big controversy appears to be that time was granted on the play at second base that saw Max Muncy needing trainer attention.
Yankees fans are Big Mad about this, but it seemed perfectly reasonable to grant time in that situation when the play was over and both a player appeared hurt and there appeared to be a potential interference play (it was challenged by both teams).
When Kenley asked for time, by all appearances the play appeared to be done as the runner was retreating to the bag, so the umpires granted it. Now was it signaled too late? Maybe, sure. So perhaps the optics were less than ideal, but the process of granting time itself seemed justified to me and not some miscarriage of justice that it’s being framed as.
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The Dodgers are now 86-45 with the win.
The series will conclude tomorrow on ESPN at 1:00 PM HST/4:00 PM PST/7:00 PM EST with Clayton Kershaw facing Domingo German.
