Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
Well, that wasn’t boring, at least.
Let’s be straight honest about Brandon Beachy, who dug the Dodgers a hole by going only four innings and allowing four runs, including Nick Markakis‘ first (!) homer of the season: He’s coming back from really, really far away. You know about his history of arm injuries by now, and that he’s even in the big leagues again is remarkable. To expect him to just appear after a decade or so away and be great again, well, no. Not realistic.
Of course, the flip side of that is that he’s probably only back here now because his rehab stint was ending and the Dodgers had a hole in the rotation. It could be that they just stick with him for another minute until an inevitable trade is made before the end of the month. It could be that Zach Lee actually gets a shot next time around, because Lee also pitched tonight and is currently in his sixth shutout inning. It’s obviously too soon to give up on a talent like Beachy; of course, you have to win games, too.
Anyway, the rest of this game got weird. The Dodgers put up four in the fifth to tie it, helped by whatever the hell was going on here and Adrian Gonzalez‘ 21st homer of the season. Unfortunately, Adam Liberatore gave up the lead — of course it was Juan Uribe, just of course — with one, and Joel Peralta gave up two more. Still, there was room to threaten in the eighth against Andrew McKirahan and Luis Vizcaino, who combined to give up three straight singles to Gonzalez, Justin Turner — one of his four hits — and Scott Van Slyke.
So, that should have been good, but, uh, no. On Van Slyke’s single to left, Gonzalez was waved home in a, shall we say, questionable decision, and Eury Perez made a perfect throw to nail him. Yasiel Puig flew out to left. Jimmy Rollins flew out to right. But no matter! In the ninth, they loaded them again… and scored only when Howie Kendrick grounded into a double play. The Dodgers got 11 hits and scored four runs. The Braves had 11 hits as well, but with four walks, and got seven. Baseball, man. Baseball.
