Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers continued their winning road trip in the series opener in New York against the Mets, putting together a crooked number in the 4th that powered them to a 9-2 victory. They have now won four of their last five games. It’s good.
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Things didn’t start off so well though, as Kershaw surrendered a 1st inning homer to J.D. Davis that put the Mets ahead 1-0, though he did manage to limit the damage going forward.
Meanwhile, the bats didn’t help him out much through three innings, getting shutout by Noah Syndergaard. However, they changed that up in the 4th behind a Cody Bellinger walk, a Corey Seager single, and an A.J. Pollock single that tied the game at 1-1. Gavin Lux then immediately followed by waiting on a hanging curve and then exploding on it for a three-run dong to center, his second of his career, which gave them a 4-1 lead.
Following another quiet two frames, they tacked on further in the 7th with two outs. Joc Pederson singled against the shift, Max Muncy followed with a walk, and Chris Taylor hooked a double to left to plate two and make it 6-1. Bellinger then followed him by lining a single the other way to up the lead to 7-1.
Kershaw seemed to be rolling going into the 7th, throwing up zeros in his previous five frames, but after getting an out to start he then surrendered a single and two walks to load the bases before being relieved. He ended his night allowing two runs on four hits and three walks in 6.1 innings while striking out five. It basically ended his rare streak of three straight losses and four sub-par starts.
Joe Kelly took over in his fireman role, inducing a bouncer in front of the plate that Kelly made a seemingly simple but actually great spinning play to get the runner at home. However, he then allowed a single that scored a run charged to Kershaw and made it 7-2 before getting out of the jam with a ground out.
They extended the lead in the 8th after a Lux single and an Edwin Rios two-run dong, his third of the year and of his career, making it 9-2.
Casey Sadler then entered in the 8th with that sizable cushion, getting a 1-2-3 inning. Josh Sborz was then allowed to get the 9th, walking a batter but also getting a strikeout in his scoreless frame to secure the win.
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With the win, the Dodgers are now 96-53 on the year. They are still 4 games up on the Braves in the NL and trail the Yankees by just 1 game in the MLB.
The Dodgers do it against the Mets again tomorrow at 1;10 PM HST/4:10 PM PST/7:10 PM EST. Hyun-Jin Ryu will square off against Jacob deGrom in another marquee matchup.
