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.
“I found out yesterday morning,” Roberts said of Ohtani’s injury. “So if there’s a chance that we could kind of be proactive and get it drained and do whatever we need to do to try to manage it, along with the rest for the All-Star break, we were gonna do that.
“But obviously the way he’s swinging the bat hasn’t really affected performance,” Roberts added. “We have certainly curtailed the stealing bases. But he feels good, obviously, and he’s gonna be DH’ing the next three games.”
The Diamondbacks took advantage of the Dodgers’ bullpen game — and three defensive errors.
Right-handed pitcher 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.
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.
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.
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 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.
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