CLEVELAND — It had been some time because the Dodgers’ final stress-free win.
Getting into Monday, the group had not solely received simply thrice over its earlier 9 video games — however wanted additional innings after blown ninth-inning saves in two of them, and a late-game go-ahead dwelling run from Teoscar Hernández within the different.
Such theatrics underscored the membership’s underwhelming play in latest weeks, with supervisor Dave Roberts bemoaning every little thing from poor fundamentals, to continued pitching accidents, to a lineup that had most of all gotten again out of sync.
“We’ve got to kind of lock in our hitting zone,” Roberts mentioned Monday afternoon, “and continue to take good swings.”
In a 7-2 win over the Cleveland Guardians on Memorial Day, the Dodgers lastly did.
Whereas Yoshinobu Yamamoto cruised via a six-inning, two-run begin, the membership’s lineup awoke from a latest lull that had seen them fail to prime 5 runs (excluding additional innings) in every of their final seven video games.
Shohei Ohtani offered an early spark, hitting a leadoff dwelling run for the second straight recreation to take the MLB lead with 19 lengthy balls. Andy Pages added an RBI single within the second inning, earlier than the Dodgers mounted two prolonged rallies within the fifth and sixth, scoring two runs in every inning.
Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani, left, runs the bases after main off the sport with a house run towards the Cleveland Guardians on Might 26.
(David Dermer / Related Press)
The bullpen was shakier, with Alex Vesia stranding two runners within the seventh earlier than Tanner Scott — coming off two blown saves in his earlier three outings — labored round José Ramírez’s second double of the sport within the eighth.
However within the prime of the ninth, Will Smith punctuated the night time with a house run over the tall left-field wall at Progressive Subject to make sure the Dodgers (33-21) obtained again within the win column.
“It was [nice], just to get a lead and then to add on, and to be able to tack on late,” Roberts mentioned, “to kind of make it not an eventful last couple of innings, to win a game like this.”
As he’s completed in virtually all of his 11 begins this season, Yamamoto paved the best way for a clean path to victory.
In a win that improved his report to 6-3, the Japanese right-hander yielded simply three hits and two walks whereas placing out seven. He lowered his season earned-run common to 1.97, second-best within the Nationwide League.
“I mean, you could argue he’s been our most valuable player,” Roberts mentioned, accounting for the rash of different accidents which have ravaged the rotation. “Simply to have the ability to log six or seven innings and type of reset your ‘pen, give us a good chance to win every time he goes out there, has been huge. I feel very confident in calling him the staff ace.”
Yamamoto also made a key play with his glove in the third inning. With two on and no outs, Yamamoto raced off the mound to field a bunt that first baseman Freddie Freeman misread, anticipating Cleveland second baseman Will Wilson to angle the ball up the third-base line. With Freeman out of position, Yamamoto fielded the ball and ran all the way to first himself, lunging to tag Wilson on the foot for a key out in an inning that resulted in only one run.
“It’s good to have athletic pitchers on the mound,” Freeman joked.
The offense made certain to again up Yamamoto’s contributions, too, driving the momentum from Ohtani’s first-pitch dwelling run to a productive all-around efficiency towards the Guardians (29-24) and their hard-throwing starter, Gavin Williams.
The Dodgers racked up eight hits and eight walks, driving Williams’ pitch depend to 109 by the point he exited with two outs within the fifth. Every of the primary seven hitters within the lineup recorded an RBI, with Hernández and Max Muncy plating runs within the fifth earlier than Mookie Betts and Freeman hit back-to-back RBI singles within the sixth.
“The last couple weeks, it seems like when we’ve pitched, we didn’t hit [and] when we hit, we didn’t pitch,” Freeman mentioned. “That’s kind of the course of a baseball season. It’s going to happen. So hopefully when you put it all together in a game like today, it can really jump-start us.”
