But the right-hander from Japan was good enough to beat ace Zack Greinke and the Arizona Diamondbacks for the second time in less than two weeks. Gonzalez scored, giving the Dodgers their second unearned run and a 3-1 lead.NOTES: Brock Stewart (1-2, 6.55 ERA) will replace Bud Norris (6-10, 5.05) as the Dodgers’ starting pitcher Saturday night against the Diamondbacks, manager Dave Martinez announced before Friday night’s game.
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By reaching 160 innings for the season Friday, Maeda (15-9) collected another bonus, pushing his total earnings this year to $9.65 million. He outdueled Greinke, a former Dodger who allowed only one earned run.
“My command was off in general today and I wasn’t able to get into my groove”, Maeda said of the second inning. “I put a lot of pressure on the position players to pick up the slack”. Miller ended up throwing 5.1 innings, and was charged with four earned runs on seven hits, with two walks and two K’s. The Dodgers (84-64) increased their division lead over San Francisco to five games as a result and crawled within four of Washington (88-60) for the second-best record in the NL as the two division leaders continue their battle to secure home-field advantage for their likely meeting in the NL Divisional Series.
The Los Angeles Dodgers rallied from six runs down, only to lose in extra innings Sunday night. Closer Kenley Jansen gave up Chris Owings’ triple and a long sacrifice fly by Paul Goldschmidt in the bottom of the ninth, but got Jake Lamb to ground out into the defensive shift to end the game.
Randall Delgado in relief walked his first two batters faced to force in a run, loading the bases in a 7-4 game.
Goldschmidt is 1 for 12 and has struck out seven times in the first three games of the four against the Dodgers. A wild pitch allowed Joc Pederson to race home, and Chase Utley doubled in Andrew Toles.
Chase Utley led off the game with a double and scored two batters later on a triple by Justin Turner.
In the eighth, the D-backs’ Enrique Burgos walked Josh Reddick, then Barnes singled up the middle.
But Greinke was more like himself than he was September 5 when he gave up five home runs to the Dodgers. “With Kenta, you can tell”. “He didn’t really have it until the fourth inning, so it was a grind for him”. “He still found a way, as he seemingly always does, to give us a chance to win”. The Dodgers split the 10 games but return home with their fourth consecutive National League West title nearly a foregone conclusion. The Dodgers walked Segura intentionally, but Owings spoiled the strategy by hitting an RBI double to left. Arizona scored a run on nearly automatic closer Kenley Jansen in the bottom of the ninth, but came up short.
“The offense was fine”, Roberts said. He prefaced his statement by saying through an interpreter: “I know you’re not going to believe what I say”. “I thought that we competed very well”.
Maeda (15-9) walked the bases loaded as he seemed miffed throughout the inning that he wasn’t getting calls on the corner by home plate umpire Chris Conroy.
Two starts ago, he gave up a career-high five home runs in his first start at Dodger Stadium since leaving for the big bucks and sunsets of Arizona. “Too many strikeouts, but they pitched well”.
Also, former IN basketball coach Bob Knight attended, watching the game from a suite. Well, he has kept the Dodgers in games start after start, and in a rewarding twist, he has been every bit as good as, if not better than, Greinke has been for the Diamondbacks this season.
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Stewart (2-2) beat the Diamondbacks on September 7 at Dodger Stadium for his first big league win. Norris will be available out of the bullpen.
