Dodgers 16, Rangers 3: The bats were loving life in The House The Dodgers Built

Chad Moriyama 07/22/2023 Game Recaps Leave A Comment

After the back-and-forth game yesterday, the Dodgers took an early lead today and didn’t let up, smashing the Rangers in a 16-3 victory. Maybe this is the home field of the Dodgers after all.

The bats piled up 18 hits with eight for extra bases along with seven walks, pushing the Dodgers to 10-2 in their last 12 games and they’ve now won their last five series.

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Bobby Miller‘s quest to find the dominance he had soon after his debut got off to a rough start today when Marcus Semien greeted him with a lead-off homer on the second pitch he threw. That said, Miller did rebound quickly by retiring the next three batters, including two strikeouts, but it was 1-0 to the Rangers early.

For the Rangers, Dane Dunning was on the mound, and his stuff hasn’t been impressive while his peripherals indicate he’s been extremely lucky. While he faced the minimum in the 1st after erasing a single with a double play, the 2nd was much more problematic.

Max Muncy led off the frame with a clean single to right and advanced to second on an error, then J.D. Martinez followed by walking, and David Peralta capitalized with a double to drive in a run and tie the game.

A Jason Heyward walk followed to load the bases, and James Outman came up with a single down the line in right for a lead, but he was limited to just the single because of a combination of the read on the bases and getting unlucky with the bounce off the fence.

That was significant because Miguel Rojas grounded into a double play following it, and while it was 3-1, that sorta killed the rally.

The 3rd didn’t get any better for Dunning, as he gave up back-to-back homers to Freddie Freeman (19) and then Muncy (23) to increase the lead to 5-1.

That was it for Dunning, who was not only ineffective but ran up a high pitch count. Fortunately, the Dodgers didn’t stop there, as the put up another two-out rally in the 4th.

After a one-out Rojas walk, with two down Freddie came up again and yoinked a homer just fair down the line in right for his 20th homer to push the lead to 7-1.

Back-to-back walks to Will Smith and Muncy followed that, and J.D. capitalized by smashing his 24th dinger of the year for a 10-1 lead and seemed rather demoralizing.

Oh right, while all this was going on, Miller was still on the mound and having a bit of an adventure himself. After an infield single in the 2nd, he botched a potential double play on a missed catch, then gave up another single to get into trouble, but then induced a double play to escape. After the rare clean inning in the 3rd, he hit a batter with one out in the 4th and then gave up a double, but managed to work out of that mess as well.

Unfortunately, his scoreless frame streak ended in the 5th, as he couldn’t get the final out of the inning. A lead-off single was followed by two outs, but another single put a pair on, and both then scored on a “triple” by Nathaniel Lowe that was comically misplayed by Peralta to make it 10-3.

He did manage to not give up anything further in the 5th, and then worked an easy 6th to complete his outing in a comfortable win.

Results weren’t probably exactly what he wanted, but he looked as good as he has since his quick start: 6 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 0 BB, 6 K, 85 Pitches.

The bats of the Dodgers did go silent for a few innings, or at least as quiet as they were today. They managed two singles in the 5th and a double in the 6th, but the Rangers pen got a clean 7th.

The 8th did not go as smoothly for them, as back-to-back singles for Freeman and Smith started things, then Muncy doubled off the wall in left for a run and made the Rangers waive the white flag by putting position player Brad Miller in to pitch.

A J.D. sacrifice fly followed and added another run, then Peralta snuck a single through to make it 13-3 before the carnage ended.

Things didn’t stop there, as after walks to Outman and Yonny Hernandez in the 9th, Jonny Deluca put the cherry on top with a three-run shot. It was the second of his career and made it 16-3.

On the flip side, for the Dodgers pen it was Yency Almonte in the 7th in relief of Miller, and he got a comfortable clean frame. He handed the baton to Phil Bickford in the 8th, who got a scoreless inning while giving up just a single. I had hoped that would be the end for him and the Dodgers would bring in a position player, but unfortunately Bickford was back out for the 9th and gave up a walk and single with two outs before wrapping things up nicely.

Fun!

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The origin story of the Dodgers’ new celly.

Dancing might be the only thing Freddie’s bad at.

The dugout was loose…

…and so was the bullpen (or at least Brusdar Graterol was).

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NL WESTRECORD
Dodgers57-40
Giants54-44 (3.5 GB)*
Diamondbacks54-45 (4 GB)

*Either still playing or will play later.

The series concludes tomorrow as the Dodgers go for the sweep of the Rangers at the ungodly hour of 8:35 AM HT/11:35 AM PT/2:35 PM ET, and it’ll be another rookie on the mound in Emmet Sheehan (4.91 ERA/3.51 xERA/5.57 DRA) facing off against veteran Martin Perez (4.84/5.59/6.70).

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