Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers escaped Miami with a series win despite being dominated by Valente Bellozo — Is this the most Pope-sounding name in baseball? #Topical — for 5 1/3 innings. Freddie Freeman hit a two-out single in the first, and that was the only hit they got off Bellozo. Landon Knack matched Bellozo through five, and the Dodgers finally broke through in the sixth off Cade Gibson. They scored a run in the sixth before putting up six in the seventh and a James Outman three-run homer in the ninth to really put the game out of reach. Matt Sauer came up big, earning a four-inning save with one hit and no earned runs (two errors in the ninth gave the Marlins an unearned run, but that doesn’t really matter). The Dodgers became the first team to 25 wins and have won nine of their last 11.
Today, they travel to Arizona for their first series against an actual NL West contender (read: not the Rockies). Arizona has been a bit of a disappointment considering their lofty expectations, “only” at 19-18 and 4.5 games back of San Diego and San Francisco. They’ve lost five of their last six series and just lost two of three against the Mets to start this homestand. The Dodgers took seven of 13 against Arizona last season but did win five of seven in the desert.
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| 6:40 P.M. | Phoenix | ||
| DH | Ohtani (L) | RF | Carroll (L) |
| SS | Betts | 2B | Marte (S) |
| 1B | Freeman (L) | DH | Smith (L) |
| C | Smith | 1B | Naylor (L) |
| 3B | Muncy (L) | 3B | Suárez |
| RF | Pages | C | Moreno |
| LF | Conforto (L) | LF | Gurriel Jr. |
| 2B | Kim (L) | CF | Thomas (L) |
| CF | Outman (L) | SS | Perdomo (S) |
| P | Yamamoto (R) | P | Pfaadt (R) |
Yoshinobu Yamamoto gets the ball for the Dodgers today. Why read my words when Dustin wrote an excellent breakdown earlier. Go read that, and all I’ll add is that Yamamoto only faced Arizona once last season. He held them to five hits and two walks over six shutout innings and had plenty of early run support, as the offense put up five runs in the second off Jordan Montgomery.
Brandon Pfaadt gets his eight start of the season and leads the NL with five wins. He had a bit of an ugly start to the season, allowing seven runs over his first two starts. He only allowed four earned over 23 2/3 innings over his next four starts, but the wheels fell off in Philly last time out. Pfaadt allowed six earned runs (+ one unearned) and nine hits in only 4 2/3 innings against the Phillies to raise his ERA up to 3.79. He’s struggled in his career against the Dodgers with a 6.20 ERA and an .819 OPS allowed. Pfaadt did strike out 10 in 5 2/3 in LA last September after Justin Wrobleski allowed eight runs in the second (and 10 runs in 5 1/3).
Pfaadt has had a bit of an odd season so far. He’s been one of the best pitchers at getting chases (34.2 percent, 90th percentile) and has one of the best walk rates (4.1 percent, 92nd percentile). The rest of the numbers are not great. His 45.5 percent hard hit rate is in the 23rd percentile and has averaged a 91.2 MPH exit velocity against, which is in the 16th percentile. Pfaadt’s thrown five different pitches this year, leading with a fastball at 30.2 percent of the time. He’s thrown a change and a sweeper 19.5 percent of the time, a sinker 18.9 percent and a curve 11.9 percent. He’d thrown a curve closer to five percent of the time in his other two Major League seasons, and it’s gotten absolutely rocked so far this season. He’s allowed more extra base hits on his curve than any other pitch despite throwing it much less frequently and while it does have a 34.9 percent whiff rate, he’s also allowed a .909 slugging and .716 expected slugging off it. He experimented with throwing it more often early in the season, but is back down to around a five percent usage in his last two starts.
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Michael Kopech made his first rehab outing today.
Dave Roberts said he expects Michael Kopech to make at least 4-5 rehab outings, "and then it's a real conversation."
— Sonja Chen (@SonjaMChen) May 9, 2025
Maybe not quite a 1:1 comparison, but Evan Phillips also had to fully build up and ended up doing 6 rehab outings (would've been 7 if not for Treinen injury).
He opened for OKC tonight and it wasn’t exactly smooth sailing. He faced five batters and walked .. five batters. Unless Gameday is glitching, he threw 23 pitches and three of them were strikes. The good news is there’s no chance his next rehab outing is worse (also he seemed to touch 98, which matters more than results right now).
Some other injury updates regarding Tommy Edman and Emmet Sheehan.
Tommy Edman faced Emmet Sheehan today and took some live at-bats. Sheehan was up to 40 pitches. Things appear to be trending well there. Dave Roberts said they’re still building Sheehan up as a starter after TJ — he’s almost 12 months post-op.
— Fabian Ardaya (@FabianArdaya) May 8, 2025
Edman took some live ABs off Sheehan today. He’s eligible to return from the IL on Saturday, but yesterday it was reported that he likely wouldn’t actually return until the Dodgers return home Tuesday. Sheehan threw 40 pitches today and could be close to going on a rehab assignment, and will be built back up as a starter.
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First pitch is scheduled for 6:40 PM PT and will be shown on SportsNet LA.
