Cardinals 7, Dodgers 2: A miserable start to the road trip

Chad Moriyama 05/01/2026 Game Recaps Leave A Comment

After a rather rough close to April, the Dodgers were looking to start May right on the road. They did anything but that, as they started the game playing messy and the frustration only built from there, both at the plate and on the mound in a 7-2 loss to the Cardinals.

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For a team wanting to get right, the 1st started about as poorly as possible for the Dodgers and Emmet Sheehan. At the very beginning, things were actually fine, as there was just a groundball single sandwiched between two outs at first, but another single followed and they both advanced after a Will Smith throwing error on an attempted backpick at second. That proved relevant immediately, as Sheehan then balked by changing from a hybrid delivery to the stretch in the middle of the next at-bat without declaring the switch.

That was frustrating at the time because it scored a run and it was an 0-2 count, but Nolan Gorman made it not matter by eventually homering on a 92 MPH fastball for a three-spot.

Yeah, 92 MPH for Sheehan in the 1st … that’s new.

After he got out of the 1st, then got a clean 2nd, but a Alec Burleson homer in the 3rd made it four runs.

A single and steal followed, but Sheehan worked around that, and he navigated further traffic in the 4th after a one-out double. He got two outs in the 5th, but then surrendered a double, and that was it for him in what was not a promising start: 4.2 IP, 8 H, 4 R, 0 BB, 8 K, 97 Pitches.

Not ideal with Blake Snell‘s return looming.

Anyway, Jack Dreyer entered and helped him avoid another blemish to his line to close the 5th, but then found trouble himself in the 6th. He gave up a pair of singles but then got three outs on three consecutive pitches to close the frame.

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Cardinals starter Matthew Liberatore began by cruising through the top of the lineup, which is quite frankly nothing new nowadays. The rally unsurprisingly started in the 2nd with two outs, as Andy Pages singled and Max Muncy doubled to the wall to make it 3-1, but that was all.

After a clean 3rd, the Dodgers seemed to have a promising 4th, as a pair of singles started the inning. However, a lineout and double play later, and there was nothing doing for the struggling offense. They followed that by going down in order in the 5th, but then at least rallied a bit in the 6th.

A one-out single from Freddie Freeman was followed by walks from Smith and Teoscar Hernandez to get back to the dreaded bases loaded situation. It was up to Kyle Tucker, who did manage a sacrifice fly at least to make it 4-2 Cardinals.

That knocked Liberatore out of the game, and George Soriano took over, getting Pages to lineout to center, though Pages swung at ball four twice. Soriano also got the 7th, working around a lead-off walk to keep things rolling along.

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The Dodgers were lucky to be in the game at that point, but it finally caught up to them when Edgardo Henriquez started the 7th with a single and a walk. Jordan Walker followed by reaching out and tripling down the line in left to score them both.

Walker also eventually scored in the inning on a groundout after Edgardo had also hit a batter, so 7-2 Cardinals.

Kyle Hurt finished things in the 8th with another clean inning, this time with a pair of strikeouts.

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Anyway, the bats got a single and walk in the 8th, leading to … well, nothing. Then they got a two-out double in the 9th but that was it.

Swell.

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20-12, though they are 5-8 in their last 13.

The Dodgers will look to get on track again as the series continues tomorrow at 1:15 PM HT/4:15 PM PT/7:15 PM ET on FOX. It’ll be Roki Sasaki looking for better results against Michael McGreevy.

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