Miguel Rojas had practiced his dance moves in the Dodgers dugout long before he hit the go-ahead, seventh-inning home run. Before the game, he strutted around the concrete, at one point even grabbing Dalton Rushing, decked in full catcher’s garb, to get hyped.
Rojas, who pinch-hit for Alex Freeland in the bottom of the seventh and homered to center, was more measured as he crossed the plate with fewer pre-game, jitter-removing antics. His veteran steadiness would’ve never indicated that he hit a pinch-hit home run only one other time in his career.
The Dodgers’ 4-3 win over Tampa Bay rid the Dodgers of their middling road performance. The team had split a six-game stint, capped by a Sunday loss to the White Sox before returning home.
None found more immediate success than Kyle Tucker, who temporarily put his .227 batting average on the trip in the rearview mirror. For how long remains a question. Tucker’s season so far has looked more like a teenager testing out their driver’s license: stopping and starting and stopping again. Yet everything seemed to be workingwhen the Dodgers (46-27) beat Tampa Bay (41-28).
Of the five Dodgers who’ve played in at least 60 games, Tucker has the lowest season batting average (.238). Still, he battled in an eight-pitch duel in the second inning before taking a changeup 384 feet over the right-center wall. His home run tied the score at three apiece, but Tucker, who went two for four, wasn’t finished.
The next inning, Rays’ Ben Williamson hit a two-out single to Tucker, and Tampa’s Jonathan Aranda darted from third toward home. Tucker lasered a ball from right field to Rushing, who tagged Aranda out on the slide.
The defensive play helped buoy an otherwise precarious start by pitcher Eric Lauer. The lefty had been undefeated in his three starts with the Dodgers, a large departure from the 1-5 record he had this season with the Blue Jays. After starting his year with Toronto with a 6.69 ERA, Lauer had dropped it to 2.76 with the Dodgers.
But inconsistencies plagued Lauer’s start, ranging from the three earned runs he gave up in the first two innings to a pitch clock violation in the fourth. While Lauer eventually settled, the command of his fastball remained absent. He normally crosses the strike zone with 53.7% accuracy on his fastball, getting batters to chase about 37% of the time. In the Rays series opener, Lauer only threw his four-seam in the zone 42% of the time, cutting his chase rate to 23%.
In other words, the best pitch in Lauer’s arsenal became one of his worst, and the Rays took advantage. Junior Caminero doubled in the first inning and Ryan Vilade followed with a home run on a cutter, silencing a sold-out Dodger Stadium before the game could even heat up. The Rays tacked on another run on a safety squeeze, taking the lead until Tucker’s home run. Lauer finished his game after six innings, giving up three earned runs and three walks, striking out four.
Tampa Bay starter Nick Martinez fared about as well. The righty lasted 5 1/3 innings of three-run baseball, striking out six batters and walking one.
While there was movement on the bases for both starters, the game lulled until the seventh. A couple of feet separated Rushing’s foul ball from a home run. Reliever Steven Matz didn’t get so lucky with Rojas, who gave the Dodgers the series-opening win.
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