The Dodgers suffered a deflating 9-3 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks at Dodger Stadium on Friday to start their final series before the All-Star break.
But if there was a silver lining to the Dodgers’ rough performance, it was that superstar Shohei Ohtani looked fine at designated hitter after being scratched from his scheduled start because of irritation in his left knee.
Ohtani, who will not participate in next week’s All-Star Game in Philadelphia, hit a leadoff home run off Diamondbacks starter Eduardo Rodriguez.
“He does a really good job of taking care of himself,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of Ohtani. “Obviously, we’ve curtailed the running, and so he’s doing everything he can to help us on the offensive side. And again, it wasn’t great tonight on the run prevention, but it was the right thing for all of us, and so I think we feel good about that going forward.
“But yeah, it’s really impressive what he continues to do offensively.”
The Diamondbacks took advantage of the Dodgers’ bullpen game — and three defensive errors.
Right-hander Kyle Hurt opened and surrendered two runs on three hits through 1⅔ innings.
Arizona’s Ketel Marte and Geraldo Perdomo opened the game with base hits. Corbin Carroll grounded into a forceout at second, moving Marte to third, before Gabriel Moreno singled on a liner to right that scored Marte. Carroll then scored on an errant throw to third from Kyle Tucker that went into the Dodgers’ dugout.
After Ohtani hit his 21st homer of the season, Andy Pages hit a tying 419-foot blast to left-center for his 17th homer.
But that was all the Dodgers (61-34) would score against Rodriguez, who gave up seven hits and struck out five over six innings to improve to 8-3.
“He’s had a heck of a year,” Roberts said of Rodriguez. “I think he’s an All-Star. Last couple years it’s been a grind for him, health, but man, when this guy’s healthy, the ball’s moving all over the place; he’s a big-league pitcher, he misses barrels. And yeah, we caught a couple barrels early, hit a couple homers, but he settled in nicely. And then once he got a lead, he was just really putting it to us.”
Dalton Rushing walks back to the dugout after grounding out to end the game in the Dodgers’ 9-3 loss to Arizona on Friday.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
Arizona’s bullpen then held the Dodgers to just two hits — both coming in the ninth inning off Drey Jameson.
Will Klein (3-4) took the loss after surrendering one run through 1⅔ innings.
“I just wanted to see how he was because we’ve pushed him a little bit,” Roberts said about pulling Klein. “And I just wanted to make sure, in talking to him man to man, just how he felt going back out there for another inning because we pushed him a little bit. He’s done a nice job.”
After Brock Stewart gave up a two-run home run to Tim Tawa in the fourth, Arizona (47-47) tacked on two more runs in the fifth after the Dodgers’ second error.
Stewart walked Perdomo to start the inning. Then, Carroll grounded into a fielder’s choice in front of the plate and reached first safely, with an errant throw by Rushing allowing Perdomo to reach third. Moreno grounded out to third to drive in Perdomo. A balk by Edgardo Henriquez followed by a wild pitch allowed Carroll to score.
“It has been sloppy two of the last three games,” Roberts said of the errors. “Don’t know the reason for it. Obviously, it never feels good to not convert outs. So yeah, I think that it’s one of those things that we got to get better at.”
Arizona extended its lead in the sixth after Tawa hit an RBI single to left and Perdomo drove in a run on a groundout to first. Tawa ended his three-hit, four-RBI performance with a run-scoring single in the eighth.
Reliever Alex Vesia threw a scoreless ninth inning for his fifth consecutive scoreless outing to cap a night the Dodgers probably would like to forget.
“It’s not really a wild card; it’s a bullpen game,” Hurt said. “We’re all going to go out there and do our part; we got a job. Tonight, you know, there was a couple walks, some hits. It just wasn’t a good day for us. … We’ll be better.”
Roberts said the Dodgers might bring up another arm to finish the series.
“We’re going to have that conversation,” he said.
