Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
Last time the Dodgers and Giants met, the Dodgers swept a four-game series against their rivals, and tonight they got this series off to an ideal start with a 8-2 victory after jumping on the Giants early and hanging on.
They have now won five in a row against them and are 18.5 games ahead.
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It was actually the Giants that struck first, and they even seemed to have Andrew Heaney on the ropes a bit. After starting the game by hitting a batter, Heaney got the next two, but then gave up a single to left and a bunt single to load the bases before issuing a walk to force a run in. Fortunately, he got back on track and got a fly out to end the threat.
That was actually all Heaney gave up, though. He issued a walk in the 2nd and a pair of singles in the 3rd, but got a clean 4th before exiting due to pitch count restrictions: 4 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 2 BB (1 HBP), 7 K, 74 Pitches.
When Heaney did exit, he had the lead. This was because after Logan Webb started with a smooth 1st, he ran into mess in the 2nd, as a Jake Lamb single was cashed in by a Max Muncy homer to center. It was a bit of a wall-scraper and his reaction to that was hilarious after his luck recently, but his 10th made it 2-1.
The 3rd ended up being the bigger number, though. A James Outman single was followed by a Mookie Betts double, and Trea Turner plated a run with a sacrifice fly. Freddie Freeman continued the rally with a single, and then Will Smith doubled to score another and make it 5-1.
The band marched on in the 5th, with back-to-back doubles from Freddie and Will plating yet another run against Webb, who exited down 6-1.
Out of the pen for Heaney was Chris Martin making his Dodgers debut. He took six pitches to get the three outs, but sandwiched between that was a Wilmer Flores homer to left that sorta summed up Martin’s issues this year and made it 6-2.
No matter, as in the 7th the run came back home behind a Trea missile to left-center for his 17th of the year to make it 7-2.
Fortunately, the rest of the Dodgers pen was dominant. Caleb Ferguson continued his outstanding year with a clean inning, Yency Almonte did the same in the 7th, and David Price got in on the action in the 8th for nine retired in a row.
While it seemed like the bats were done, they added more insurance in the 9th behind an Outman double and a Freddie single to make it 8-2. Outman is unstoppable.
Phil Bickford closed the game out with a six-run lead, cruising to the win with a 1-2-3 frame on 11 pitches.
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Just trying to help out.
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The Dodgers improve to 69-33 (nice) and maintain a 12-game lead over the Padres in the NL West.
The trade deadline will happen before tomorrow’s game (12:00 PM HT/3:00 PM PT/6:00 PM ET), which starts at 3:45 PM HT/6:45 PM PT/9:45 PM ET on TBS with Tyler Anderson facing Alex Wood.
