Jim Cella
LOS ANGELES—The Dodgers went back to the basics to snap their 2-game losing streak on Wednesday. Los Angeles used terrific pitching, stellar defense and timely bunting to blank San Diego 6-0. The win breaks the tie in the win/loss column with the Padres and ups the Dodgers’ season record to 12-7. San Diego has their 3-game win streak come to an end and drops to 11-8.
Spot-starter Tony Gonsolin kept the Dodgers in the game until the offense was able to manufacture a pair of runs in the fifth inning. Gonsolin pitched 4.2 scoreless frames and gave way to the best bullpen in MLB to shut the door for the final 4.1 innings. Los Angeles would break the game open in the eighth when Justin Turner launched a 3-run homer to stake LA to the 6-run lead.
GAMERECAP: Gonsolin’s toughest stretch of his second start of the season came in the very first inning. He gave up back-to-back, 1-out singles to Trent Grisham and Manny Machado but then struck out Tommy Pham and got Jake Cronenworth to fly out to right field to end the threat. Gonsolin started to spot his split-finger fastball in the second and recorded 1-2-3 innings in three straight frames. He ran into trouble in the fifth by giving up a leadoff walk and a 2-out single to Jurickson Profar. Dodgers’ manager Dave Roberts decided to bring in Blake Treinen to face hot-hitting Fernando Tatis Jr. and the move paid off as Treinen struck out Tatis Jr. on six pitches.
The Dodgers used “small ball” in the bottom of the fifth to take a 2-0 lead. AJ Pollock led off the inning with a 5-pitch walk. Chris Taylor stepped into the batter’s box, read that Machado was playing deep at third base and dropped a bunt for an infield single. Edwin Ríos drove home the eventual game-winning run with a line drive up the middle that deflected off Padres’ starting pitcher Zach Davies’ glove and rolled harmlessly into right field. Pollock scored on the play and Taylor was able to move up to third base. Roberts then defied the current MLB strategy of long ball and called for a safety squeeze bunt from Austin Barnes. Barnes pushed the ball down the first base line. The ball rolled past a charging Davies and settled into no-man’s land in front of first base. Taylor came home to make the score 2-0 but unfortunately Ríos was thrown out at second after he overran the bag.
Treinen earned his first win as a Dodger by pitching a scoreless sixth inning and then Pedro Baez and Brusdar Graterol combined to shut down the Padres in the seventh and eighth.
Los Angeles returned to their home run ways in the bottom of the eighth and added four insurance runs. Barnes started the crooked-number inning with an infield single that Profar did well to field at shortstop going to his left. He was unable to make an accurate throw to first and Barnes beat the throw for his third hit in the last two games. After Joc Pederson flew out to right field, Mookie Betts hit a swinging bunt that eluded the left side of the infield for a single – moving Barnes up to second. Cody Bellinger dropped a double down the left field when went inside-out on a swing and sent a that sent a first-pitch sinker into the stands after one bounce. Turner put the game out of reach with a 385-foot homer that barely cleared the wall in right-center on a 1-0 off-speed pitch.
Scott Alexander came on to pitch the ninth but allowed the first three batters he faced to reach base. Roberts wasted little time in signaling for Kenley Jansen to douse the rally flames. Jansen struck out Edward Olivares and Austin Hedges and then finished off the game by getting Profar to ground out to second.
GAME HIGHLIGHTS:
HE SAID IT: “That fifth inning, that could have been the game…that flipped the game for us.” —Dodgers’ manager Dave Roberts on the importance of Treinen getting out of the jam in the top of the fifth and then using “small ball” to manufacture runs in the bottom of the inning.
SHUTOUT STUFF: The shutout was the second of the year for the Dodgers’ pitching staff. They are tied with seven other teams for the second most blankings in MLB this year. LA also shutout Arizona on Aug. 2 when they beat the Diamondbacks 3-0 in Clayton Kershaw’s first start of the year. The Dodgers led the majors in shutouts last season with 18.
GROSS GONSOLIN: Gonsolin showed off his arsenal of four pitches on Wednesday which allowed him to be an MiLB Organizational All-Star in 2018. He struck out a career-high eight batters which tied Dustin May for the most punchouts by an LA starter this year. Gonsolin hasn’t allowed a run in his 8.2 innings pitched in 2020 and has conceded only four hits and two walks.
HE SAID IT 2: “His splitty, change up – whatever you want to call it – was gross. They weren’t seeing it well.”—Justin Turner on the reason for Gonsolin’s success.
WHEN IN DOUBT, BUNT IT OUT: Roberts changed up his in-game strategy in the fifth when he called for a bunt from Barnes after Taylor had already bunted for a single earlier in the inning. It was the first time all season that the Dodgers had dropped down two bunts in a single game. LA had 78 total bunts by positional players in all of 2019.
HE TWEETED IT: “The bunts by Chris Taylor (single) and Austin Barnes (fielder’s choice) in the 5th were the first time 2 Dodgers position players bunted in the same inning since Jimmy Rollins (single) & Ronald Torreyes (sac bunt) on 9/23/2015.”—Tweet from True Blue writer Eric Stephen
HE SAID IT 3: “I love the homers as much as anybody, but to manufacture a run is just as fun.”—Dave Roberts on the offensive strategy in the fifth inning.
B-NASTY: Graterol pitched the at-bat of the game for Los Angeles when he struck out Machado on three pitches in the eighth. He started out the former Dodger out with a 99-mph fastball at the knees on the inside corner of the plate. He followed that up with a 100-mph fastball that tailed back in and caught the outside corner before finishing him off on a nasty slider that started in the middle of the plate, broke two feet to the outside and got Machado to flail away.
LOOK KIDS, BIG BEN, PARLIAMENT: Yes, we will go there again. The Blue Pen added to their streak of scoreless outings and innings. They went 4.1 innings for the second straight night and didn’t allow a run. The Dodger relievers have now tossed 11.2 innings without allowing a run in the series and have gone 17.2 consecutive innings without conceding a score. In the last 15 games they have a 1.00 ERA and now have a 1.24 ERA for the entire season.
ON DECK: The Dodgers will look to even the 4-game series on Thursday at 6:40 p.m. when they send recent birthday boy Julio Urías to the mound. Urías, who celebrated his 24th birthday on Wednesday, leads all Dodgers’ regular starters with a 2.40 ERA for the year. He is 1-0 in 2020 and coming off his shortest outing of the year when he lasted only 4.0 innings, and 78 pitches, in a no decision against San Francisco. Urías will be facing the Padres for the first time this season and has a 1.76 ERA in his 15.1 career innings pitched against SD. Urías will face righthander Chris Paddack who beat the Dodgers on Aug. 3 when he went 6.0 innings, gave up three earned runs and struck out five.
