Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers (69-46) had a much-needed off-day yesterday following a second consecutive sweep at the hands of the Cubs. Eric Lauer finally had his regression start on Wednesday, giving up six runs on 11 hits in four innings for his first loss as a Dodger and the Dodgers first loss in a Lauer start. They did start to show some fight with a five-run eighth inning on Max Muncy and Shohei Ohtani homers, but fell just short in a 7-6 loss for a season-high sixth straight loss. They’re now three games back of the Brewers for the top seed in the NL and fell a game behind Atlanta for the 2 seed and the first round bye, but remain 8.5 games up in the NL West. They have that lead over today’s opponent, Arizona. The Diamondbacks (61-55) are coming off a four-game series split against the Padres and have won six of their last nine games. Arizona arguably started this cold streak for the Dodgers, who were 61-33 when Arizona went to LA in the final series before the All-Star break. Arizona swept the Dodgers and outscored them 23-8 in the three games, with the Dodgers nearly committing as many errors (six) as they scored runs in the three games. Arizona wasn’t super active at the deadline, but did add Lars Nootbaar from the Cardinals for a couple pitching prospects. Nootbaar’s DH’d two of the three games he’s played with Arizona and is 2-for-10 with three walks in his three games. This is the final series between Arizona and LA this season and the teams have split the 10 games they’ve played heading into today.
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| 6:40 P.M. | Phoenix | ||
| DH | Ohtani (L) | SS | Perdomo (S) |
| CF | Pages | RF | Carroll (L) |
| 1B | Freeman (L) | C | Moreno |
| 3B | Muncy (L) | 2B | Marte (S) |
| SS | Betts | DH | Nootbaar (L) |
| RF | Tucker (L) | 3B | Arenado |
| LF | T. Hernández | LF | Kepler (L) |
| 2B | Edman (S) | 1B | Tawa |
| C | Feduccia (L) | CF | Waldenschmidt |
| P | Sasaki (R) | P | Kelly (R) |
Roki Sasaki gets the ball looking to continue his recent success. Sasaki’s had a very up-and-down season and was very down five starts ago, as a six run in three inning start in San Diego gave him a 5.40 ERA on the season. In the four starts since then, Sasaki has a 2.25 ERA with six runs allowed in 24 innings and 26 strikeouts with only seven walks. His last start against the Mariners was the last time the Dodgers won a game, where Sasaki shut the Mariners out through five innings before running into trouble in the sixth. He only allowed two hits and a walk through those five innings, but gave up a leadoff triple, RBI double and a walk to the first three batters of the sixth. He got an out before a single loaded the bases and walked in a second run before giving way to Jack Dreyer, who stranded the runners to save Sasaki’s final line. Sasaki has somehow missed the Diamondbacks every time this season but faced them twice last season, once as a starter and once when he came back in a relief role. His start went poorly as he allowed five runs on five hits and two homers in four innings in his final start before hitting the IL with a shoulder issue. He returned in September in his relief tryouts for October and threw a perfect seventh inning, striking out two on 13 pitches.
Merrill Kelly gets his 21st start of the season and like Sasaki, has missed out on facing the Dodgers so far this season. It’s mostly been a rough season for Kelly with a 5.04 ERA/5.67 FIP in 114 1/3 innings this season. Things were even worse a month ago, as Kelly had a 5.84 ERA/6.09 FIP through the first three months of the season and the Diamondbacks were only 5-9 when he pitched. He had a really strong July, allowing only six runs in 27 2/3 innings over his five starts and he didn’t allow more than two in any of those starts. His first start of August came in Cleveland on Sunday and he gave up five runs on eight hits in five innings. Kelly’s faced the Dodgers 17 times in his career and it has mostly gone very poorly for him. He has a 5.56 ERA in 89 innings and the Dodgers have a .916 OPS against him, the highest of any team he’s faced more than four times in his career. Kelly also missed the Dodgers last season, but last time he faced them he allowed 10 hits and four earned runs (plus two unearned) in 5 1/3 innings with only one strikeout. That game started wildly, as Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman started the game with three straight homers. That was the last time we saw Gavin Stone on the mound before yesterday’s rehab start, and he started that game allowing a Corbin Carroll leadoff homer and four runs on four hits in the bottom of the first. The Dodgers did eventually win that game 8-6.
Freeman is in the lineup for the Dodgers after leaving Wednesday’s game after getting hit by a pitch in the hand. Hunter Feduccia gets the start behind the plate.
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Tarik Skubal will make his Dodger home debut when they return home Monday against a familiar opponent for him, the Royals. Blake Snell will return to start Tuesday.
Skubal turned in one of his best starts of the season in his penultimate start as a Tiger against the Royals. He allowed a run on four hits in 7 1/3 innings with a season-high 12 strikeouts as he led the Tigers to a 2-1 win.
Snell wrapped up his rehab assignment on Tuesday with a 73-pitch outing for OKC, getting through 3 2/3 innings with five hits and three runs allowed. He walked four batters and gave up a pair of homers which isn’t great, but he hit his benchmarks and will return to the rotation on Tuesday for his first start since May 9.
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Not a whole lot of other updates. Kendall George posted on his IG that he’s having knee surgery, Kris Bubic spoke to the media and revealed he threw his first bullpen on Sunday and should throw another one tomorrow.
Kinda surprising cause he looked just as fast afterward. https://t.co/Wi6kgSrkL0
— Chad Moriyama (@ChadMoriyama) August 7, 2026
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First pitch is scheduled for 6:40 PM PT and will be on SportsNet LA.
