The Los Angeles Dodgers rallied from six runs down, only to lose in extra innings Sunday night.
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Bothersome blisters aside, Rich Hill’s first three starts in a Los Angeles Dodgers uniform were smashing successes.
Brandon Drury singled with two outs in the 12th inning to score Paul Goldschmidt, lifting the Arizona Diamondbacks over the Dodgers 10-9. They lead the NL West by five games with a magic number to clinch trimmed to nine thanks to the latest loss by the second-place San Francisco Giants, who were shut out by the St. Louis Cardinals on Sunday. Los Angeles heads home following a 5-5 trip to host the Giants for a three-game series.
“If it gets turned over the next person, you gladly turn it over, ” La Russa said. “There’s going to be a lot of excitement, and we’re looking forward to playing well”. But back-to-back doubles by Howie Kendrick and Justin Turner got the Dodgers another run, then a walk and single brought home another, ending Ray’s day.
Maeda (15-9) wobbled at times, walking three, including back-to-back free passes in the second, but got stronger as the game went on.
“A credit to Goldschmidt”.
Gonzalez smashed a double into the right field corner to clear the bases, tying the game at 7-7.
“The one thing we did was run his pitch count pretty high to get him out of their game, but their bullpen is very good, especially when you get to the last guy (Jansen)”. “It’s just kind of the heat of the moment”.
“He still found a way, like he seemingly always does, to give us a chance to win a baseball game”, Roberts said. He threw 101 innings last year in the minors and is already at 143 this year (majors+minors), so this could be one of his final outings of the season. Matt Koch (1-0) won for Arizona, his first career win.
The Diamondbacks loaded the bases with walks in the eighth and had a chance to regain the lead after blowing a 6-0 advantage, but Mitch Haniger grounded out sharply to third base to end the inning.
The 2015 Cy Young runner-up was tagged for two runs in the first inning on Friday. With Segura on third and one out in the bottom of the first, Goldschmidt struck out again, his ninth of the series.
That wouldn’t be the case, however, after the Dodgers scored six runs in the sixth inning off Ray, Randall Delgado and Edwin Escobar to make it a tie game. He has three leadoff homers in the past five games and 17 on the season.
Hill, 9-3 with Oakland before being dealt to Los Angeles on August 1, allowed a run for the first time as a Dodger when Kyle Jensen homered off the center-field batter’s eye in the second inning. He outdueled Greinke, a former Dodger who allowed only one earned run. Shipley has won two of his last three starts but has allowed 12 earned runs in the 13.1 innings of those outings.
It was Gonzalez’s first pinch hit since September 25, 2013, and the large contingent of Dodgers fans roared. Then Enrique Hernandez drilled a 2-1 pitch over the left-field fence.Drury added what seemed an nearly needless insurance run by belting his 15th homer, a solo shot to left, in the fifth inning to make it 7-1.The Dodgers then came all the way back in the sixth. “You can’t make those mistakes in a game like this”, said Hale, who thought Greinke “pitched well”.
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So after giving up just two earned runs Sunday at Miami, he returned to the mound Friday at Arizona and topped it with one earned run allowed to start the Dodgers on the way to a 3-2 victory over the Diamondbacks and against an opposing starter in Zack Greinke, no less. Pitcher Alex Wood, normally a starter, will be activated from the 60-day disabled list on Monday, and Roberts’ plan is to start him out of the bullpen for an inning.
