SAN FRANCISCO — There was a good deal of back payments in the Dodgers’ offensive breakout Saturday night.
Of all the situations that have bedeviled the Dodgers’ underperforming offense this season, loading the bases has been their kryptonite – exemplified in the second inning Saturday night when they loaded the bases with no outs and failed to score.
After Miguel Rojas popped out and Ben Rortvedt hit into a double play, the Dodgers were 24 for 109 (.220) with the bases loaded this season. Only one team (the Minnesota Twins at .188) has been worse. Rortvedt’s 3-6-1 double play was the ninth time a Dodger hit into a GIDP with the bases loaded this season, tied for the most in the majors.
But they loaded them again with no outs in the fifth inning. A two-run double by Teoscar Hernandez broke the spell and ignited a six-run inning. Another bases-loaded situation in the sixth led to three more runs and the Dodgers beat the San Francisco Giants 13-7.
“It’s great to have a big night like tonight,” said Hernandez who joined Shohei Ohtani and Freddie Freeman with three hits. “We were losing the game early. But we put a good plan together, we executed the right way and that’s what happens when you go there and execute everything that you planned before the game.
“Nothing had changed. Just going into the games, getting closer to October, everybody is trying to do the little things, not trying to do too much and just getting on base for the next guy.”
It’s something the Dodgers’ hitters have talked about frequently but executed only sporadically over the past two months. Seven different Dodgers drove in runs Saturday. Six of the RBIs came with two strikes on the hitter.
“I just don’t see why we can’t do that as far as approach on a nightly basis,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “With two strikes, you got to give something up. And I think for me tonight, I saw us give up the pull side. And then you’re starting to get hits to the big part of the field, hits the other way to the other gap. Winning pitches. And we did that all night long. Good stuff.”
The win was matched by the San Diego Padres, leaving the Dodgers’ lead in the National League West at 2½ but dropping the magic number to clinch the division title outright to 12. The Dodgers also hold the tiebreaker over the Padres.
If this is Clayton Kershaw’s final visit to San Francisco, he did not leave on an appropriate note.Kershaw put the Dodgers in a hole when he couldn’t put hitters away and gave up four runs in the first inning.
The Giants sent nine batters to the plate against Kershaw in the opening inning. Kershaw got two strikes on five of them. Three of them got hits and another drew a walk.
Kershaw gave the Dodgers two scoreless innings after that, but left the scene after 67 pitches in just three innings. It was his shortest start since he pitched two innings at Citi Field on May 23 and didn’t come back after a rain delay. But even with that, he has a 1.84 ERA in 200⅓ innings at Oracle Park (and its naming rights predecessors).
“It wasn’t a good day,” Kershaw said of his outing. “Everybody picked me up. We scored a bunch of runs. That was awesome to see. Bad day for me but the team came through. That’s all that matters.”
The Dodgers wasted their first chance to absolve Kershaw in the second inning – a sin that looked even worse when Ohtani led off the next inning with his 49th home run of the season. The 454-foot launch was the longest home run of the season for the Dodgers.
Hernandez added a two-out RBI double that inning – foreshadowing the fifth-inning explosion.
“That was a big difference today,” Hernandez said. “Everybody was into the game. It didn’t happen in the second inning but we came back and started fighting again, every at-bat, and scored some runs.”
Two walks and a single loaded the bases for Hernandez in the fifth. His two-run double gave the Dodgers the lead. Michael Conforto drove in another run with a sacrifice fly, Rortvedt atoned for his GIDP with a two-run double of his own and Mookie Betts made it a six-pack with a two-out RBI single.
Two innings later, another productive rally started painfully. Max Muncy took a 94 mph fastball off the helmet. He stayed in to run the bases but left when the Dodgers went on defense.
It was the second night in a row Muncy had to leave the game early after being hit by a pitch. Friday night, it was his right forearm.
“As of right now, we’re okay,” Muncy said after the game. “I played enough football growing up. Know all the signs I need to be looking for, and I don’t have any of those. So that’s obviously good. Sucks to get hit again, but that’s baseball.”
A wild pitch and a two-run double by Rojas produced three more runs that inning. The only question after that was whether that would be enough to keep the Dodgers’ bullpen out of high-leverage danger.
Edgardo Henriquez struck out the side in the fourth after Kershaw left the scene. But Kirby Yates gave up three runs on three doubles and a walk in the fifth.
Justin Wrobleski restored order, retiring all seven batters he faced (four on strikeouts). A precarious two-run lead when he came into the game was a more sturdy five-run advantage when he handed it over to Michael Kopech and Tanner Scott for the final two innings.
One night after giving up a walkoff grand slam, Scott retired the side in order to end the game.
“I just wanted to get him back in the game,” Roberts said. “I want him to know that we have confidence in him, and I just felt that to kind of wash last night’s outing — what better way to do that than to get back in there.”