by Megan Garcia
The final leg of the Dodgers’ longest road trip this season started with them nearly threading together a comeback win from a 5–0 deficit, a score that might resonate in your 2024 World Series Game 5 memories. But on Thursday at Arizona, Los Angeles fell two runs shy of an echo.
The Dodgers lost 5–3 in the series opener against the Diamondbacks at Chase Field. It’s their first loss to a National League West team this season, though they continue to lead the division by a game over San Diego and San Francisco and five games over Arizona.
“It was a good matchup. This is what we expected, as far as the back-and-forth, tight ball games,” said manager Dave Roberts. “You’ve got to give credit to their defense tonight. I thought they really caught the baseball well, certainly in the outfield. I thought we squared up a lot of baseballs and didn’t have anything to show for it.”
The Dodgers avoided their first road shutout of the season with a two-run eighth thanks to RBI hits by Max Muncy and Andy Pages. In the ninth, Shohei Ohtani’s two-out, 112.9-mph, 426-foot home run in the ninth, his 11th homer of the season and fourth in the past six games, extended the rally, but Mookie Betts flied out to end the game.
It was an uphill battle for the Dodger lineup once Arizona scored five runs against Yoshinobu Yamamoto on Gabriel Moreno’s grand slam in the fourth — the first allowed by Yamamoto in his MLB career — and Ketel Marte’s solo homer in the fifth.
“Those are great, great hitters,” Yamamoto said. “I tip my hat to them.”
Before Moreno’s drive cleared the outfield, Arizona loaded the bases without clearing the infield, on a walk, infield single and hit batter.
“I didn’t have my best stuff today,” Yamamoto said. “Will (Smith) was helping me out by calling the game. However…I allowed the walk and the hit by pitch, and then I just tried to grind it out.”
Yamamoto had only given up two home runs in 2025 before this start, and his five earned runs (in five innings) were the most he’s allowed in a start this season. Entering Thursday, the right-hander had only given up four earned runs in his first seven starts.
He struck out four hitters and walked one batter in his 88 pitches (54 strikes) against Arizona.
In trying to get Yamamoto off the hook, the Dodgers had 12 baserunners, going 2-for-5 with runners in scoring position while stranding eight.
The Dodgers’ first six hitters in the lineup went 9-for-24 with two walks against Arizona’s Brandon Pfaadt and the bullpen. The bottom third of the lineup went 0-for-11 with one walk.
Smith, Muncy and Betts collected two hits each, while Freddie Freeman extended his hitting to 13 games with a sixth-inning line drive.
The three-time Silver Slugger is batting .469 (23-for-49) in that span. It’s currently the second-longest active hitting streak in Major League Baseball, behind Seattle’s J.P. Crawford’s 15-game streak.
Kopech’s First Rehab Outing
Michael Kopech faced five batters in a rehab assignment with Triple-A Oklahoma City on Thursday. Five earned runs scored as he issued five walks on 23 pitches (three strikes).
The right-hander was transferred to the 60-day injured list with a right shoulder impingement on May 1 after he started the season on the 15-day IL. Kopech sustained the injury during the 2024 postseason.
Comeback falls short for Dodgers in Arizona series opener was originally published in Dodger Insider on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.