The Dodgers made a sweeping bullpen move Saturday, and the biggest headline was a familiar one: another arm headed to the injured list, another veteran pushed off the roster, and two pitchers back in the mix ahead of the game against the Boston Red Sox.
Right-hander Will Klein was placed on the injured list with right elbow discomfort, while left-hander Cole Irvin was designated for assignment. In their place, the Dodgers brought up right-handers Kyle Hurt and Wyatt Mills.
Klein’s season had already turned rocky after a strong opening stretch. He owns a 3.67 ERA over 41.2 innings, but July has been a different story entirely.
In that month, he posted a 7.71 ERA across eight outings and then took another hit Friday night, when he allowed three runs, one earned, on three hits in 1.1 innings. Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said the team was still trying to sort out why the right-hander suddenly lost his edge.
“We’re still trying to dig into it,” Roberts said after Friday's game. “I thought there were some good fastball throws in there tonight, but the secondary stuff, that’s kind of what’s getting him.
The sweeper is not a strike; is not getting chase from it. The curveball has a different shape to it than it did last year.
So I don’t know if it’s an arm thing, a mechanics thing, but that’s something we’re trying to dig in on.”
Hurt, 28, is still working through a difficult 2026 season as he returns from Tommy John surgery. He has made 33 appearances in the majors and has a 4.59 ERA with 39 strikeouts and 18 walks in 33.1 innings. At Triple-A, the numbers have been rougher: an 11.57 ERA in nine outings, with 12 strikeouts and 10 walks over seven innings.
Mills, meanwhile, arrived in the organization on a minor league deal last August and has bounced between Triple-A and the majors this year. He opened 2026 in Triple-A, got a four-game look in May, then returned for one more game in June.
Across 4.1 big league innings, he has a 6.23 ERA, with seven walks and four strikeouts. At Triple-A OKC, he’s been far more effective, putting up a 2.41 ERA with 52 strikeouts and 18 walks in 37.1 innings.
Irvin’s day with the Dodgers was short, but memorable. The 32-year-old was added to the roster Friday and made his first MLB appearance since 2024 in a bullpen game that asked him to absorb innings. He gave up six runs in six innings, with five of those coming in the top of the seventh as Los Angeles essentially treated the game like a punt and tried to preserve the rest of the staff.
“He did what he could,” Roberts said of Irvin. “You have to sometimes take it on the chin to then give yourself a chance to win the series.
That’s kind of what you have to do. Never feels good when you’re in it.
But that’s what you have to do. And then, catching a lead I thought was great.
But yeah, I mean, I think that five-run inning kind of did us in right there."
For Irvin, an Orange County native, the brief return still meant something. He called it part of the job and said he was thankful for the chance after all the work he’s put in this season.
“Part of the job. I signed up to be a Major League Baseball player, and some nights aren’t going to go your way.
And you just got to be able to take it on the lip and keep going,” Irvin said. “I can sit here and smile because all the work that I put into my season so far got me this opportunity, and I’m not going to let anything get in the way of the joy that I have right now.
And yeah, it sucks to lose, but at the same time, I earned this opportunity.”
Irvin has now spent time in the majors with the Philadelphia Phillies, then-Oakland Athletics, Baltimore Orioles, Minnesota Twins and Dodgers, giving him a seven-year journeyman’s path to this latest stop.
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