Dodgers top Chris Sale, Braves in series opener

LOS ANGELES — Good luck convincing the Atlanta Braves that Freddie Freeman was in a home run drought.

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Freeman went deep for the first time in a month as the Dodgers took down his former team, 3-1, on Friday night in the opener of a three-game series between division leaders.

It was not as if Freeman had been failing to contribute. He entered the game batting .286 with six doubles and even had a triple since his last home run, April 6 against the Toronto Blue Jays. His solo shot into the seats on the left-field side of center was his first at home since April 1.

Freeman credited a recent change in his batting stance where he turned his front foot inward as a physical reminder to keep his hip closed in order to better utilize the entire field.

“Sometimes you’ve got to think differently up in the box, and I went with a foot turn in. And it’s worked,” Freeman said. “I’m not going to try and figure it out, but it’s working right now.”

Manager Dave Roberts continues to marvel at the veteran of 17 seasons who is willing to make whatever change is necessary to remain a productive hitter.

“That’s hard for him. It’s hard for him to try different things,” Roberts said of the nine-time All-Star, who has nearly 2,500 career hits. “But he’s a smart player and understands that at some point in a career, you’ve got to make adjustments. It is good to see him kind of change some things, whether it be a little bit of a toe in or change the routine up a little bit. That’s a good thing.”

Shohei Ohtani had a go-ahead RBI single and Emmet Sheehan saw a slight uptick in velocity while allowing one run on six hits over 4⅔ innings as the Dodgers won in their return from a 3-3 road trip to St. Louis and Houston.

The Braves were in possession of the best record in baseball earlier this week, but they lost to the two-time defending World Series champions with their top pitcher on the mound.

Left-hander Chris Sale had given up more than one run just once in a start this season, until Ohtani gave the Dodgers a 2-1 lead in the fifth inning.

Freeman’s home run against Sale in the sixth came on a 97-mph sidearm fastball and was his fourth of the season. It was also Freeman’s 100th home run since joining the Dodgers as a free agent before the 2022 season.

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Freeman hit 271 home runs during his 12 seasons with the Braves.

“I would have taken a broken-bat bloop against Chris, who is probably the toughest lefty that you’re going to face in this game as a left-handed hitter,” Freeman said. “I mean, he’s coming from behind you, so you’ve got to be willing to get hit by a pitch. That’s kind of how you have to have your mentality when you go up against him.”

Sheehan entered Friday’s start with a fastball that had averaged 94.1 mph this season, down more than 1 mph from last season when he was returning from Tommy John surgery. He was throwing as hard as 97 mph in the early innings before settling into an average of 94.3 mph on the night.

“There’s, there’s certainly some things that we’re trying to kind of figure out and tap into to kind of increase that, but at the end of the day, it’s about getting outs,” Roberts said of Sheehan’s velocity.

The right-hander allowed one walk with seven strikeouts and has 25 strikeouts over his last three outings after recording 18 over his first four starts of the year.

“I think it’s just being more consistent with my mechanics,” Sheehan said about the goal of maintaining the velocity he showed early in the outing. “… I think it’s a couple different things. But yeah, trying to maybe work on stuff during the week, throwing a lot and a lot of high-intent throws. Maybe I was a little more tired than I usually would have been.”

The Braves got to Sheehan in the second inning when Michael Harris II led off with a single and Dominic Smith doubled with one out to put runners on second and third. Austin Riley followed with an RBI single before Sheehan escaped further trouble by striking out Mike Yastrzemski and Jim Jarvis.

The Dodgers tied it in the bottom of the second when Teoscar Hernandez scored from first base on a double to right field from Kyle Tucker.

The Dodgers took a 2-1 lead in the fifth when Miguel Rojas reached second base on a throwing effort by Jarvis at shortstop. Ohtani’s two-out single scored Rojas, who was celebrating his bobblehead night that was commemorating his game-tying home run in Game 7 of the World Series.

“Yeah, I don’t know what it is about this team that when a series, a big series comes up, we always find a way to kind of like lock in and play our game,” said Rojas, who left the game early with tightness in his right hip. “I think this team is pretty good.”

Right-hander Kyle Hurt escaped a jam in the sixth inning when the Braves put the first two runners aboard, while Will Klein, Brock Stewart and Tanner Scott each followed with a scoreless inning. Scott pitched a perfect ninth inning for his third save.

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