Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers fell to the Athletics 2-0 today despite a great outing from Brett Anderson that honestly deserved a better result.
Today’s start was, of course, Anderson’s first since everybody figured he tore his Achilles against the Braves, and the first inning couldn’t have got off to a worse start, with a lead-off single on the first pitch being followed by a four-pitch walk. Unsurprisingly, two ground balls later, the A’s had a run and Billy Butler had an RBI. Fortunately, following all that, Anderson pitched five scoreless innings, only surrendering another run in his last frame of work, a solo shot to Josh Reddick. Anderson finished his seven innings of work with only five hits and a walk allowed, striking out just two but inducing a ton of grounders.
It’s remarkable how much better the bullpen looks when they have to get six outs instead of 15, and Pedro Baez and Yimi Garcia combined to throw two innings of shutout ball, striking out three and allowing only one hit.
So that was a good enough performance by the pitching staff to win, so it’s just sad for them that Athletics ace Sonny Gray took the mound and was on his game today. Gray struck out nine in his complete game shutout, allowing just three hits and one walk, completely owning the Dodgers lineup from start to finish.
Uh … this about says it all:
