LOS ANGELES – The Dodgers took too long to wake up Saturday.
Held without a hit until the fifth inning and scoreless through eight, they rallied in the ninth inning but came up short in a 3-2 loss to the Baltimore Orioles that snapped the Dodgers four-game winning streak.
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The game was their fifth consecutive this week decided by one run.
Left-hander Trevor Rogers kept the Dodgers hitters off balance and confused for the first seven innings.
Andy Pages drew a walk in the first inning but was thrown out trying to steal second. The Dodgers’ next baserunner didn’t come until there were two outs in the fifth inning when Tommy Edman’s pop-up dropped for a single in shallow center field.
Rogers retired 12 in a row between the two baserunners, five on strikeouts. His four-seam fastball averaged a modest 94.5 mph but generated seven of his 13 swings-and-misses. Using a cutter and changeup to keep the Dodgers hitters off balance, Rogers generated lots of weak contact. Even the hardest-hit balls off Rogers were easy outs – a 101.8 mph ground out by Freddie Freeman, a 101.5 mph pop up by Shohei Ohtani and a 101.4 mph fly out by Freeman.
The closest the Dodgers came to scoring off Rogers came in the seventh inning after Mookie Betts drew a two-out walk (the Dodgers’ third and final baserunner against him). Miguel Rojas drove Colton Cowser to the wall in straightaway center field where Rojas’ 393-foot fly ball came down in Cowser’s glove.
Rogers came into the game with a 5.86 ERA for the season. His longest outing since he threw seven scoreless innings for the Orioles on Opening Day did a world of good for that number, dropping it to 5.30.
The Orioles’ offense gave Rogers all the backing he would need early.
In his first start since chasing history in Chicago last weekend, Yamamoto gave up three runs in the first four innings. In his previous five starts – including last weekend against the White Sox when he took a perfect game into the eighth inning and a no-hitter into the ninth – he had a 1.01 ERA.
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There was a lot more traffic Saturday. The Orioles had baserunners in four of the first five innings against Yamamoto.
Back-to-back singles to start the second inning set up a run-scoring forceout. Back-to-back singles opened the fourth inning as well. A walk loaded the bases and Blaze Alexander drove in two with a double off the glove of diving third baseman Tommy Edman.
The Dodgers finally put a run on the board when Ohtani (back in the lineup after missing Friday’s game for the birth of his second child) led off the ninth inning with a home run.
Mookie Betts’ ninth-inning homer Friday night sparked a comeback win. After Ohtani’s 413-foot drive, the Dodgers came to life for the first time all night. They put the tying runs on base with one out when Freeman drew a walk and Betts beat out an infield single.
Alex Freeland flew out for the second out but Edman hit a line drive at right fielder Leody Taveras that should have ended the game.
But Taveras dropped the ball. One run scored on the play and Betts went to third, putting the tying run 90 feet away. But Kyle Tucker struck out, chasing a splitter in the dirt from Orioles reliever Yennier Cano to end the game.