The Dodgers had the pitching they needed to win, but the bats never turned it into a clincher.
Los Angeles fell 5-1 to the Padres on a night when the offense piled up chances and left nearly all of them on the table. The loss keeps the Dodgers waiting another day for a first-round bye, which would have been secured with a win.
The final line tells the story of a frustrating night: 10 hits, five walks, and a 1-for-9 mark with runners in scoring position. The Dodgers stranded 12 different players on base and couldn’t cash in when the game tightened.
A few hitters did their part. Teoscar Hernandez went 3-for-4, Kyle Tucker finished 2-for-4, and Andy Pages also went 3-for-4. Those three kept pressure on San Diego’s pitchers, but the support behind them never came through.
The rest of the lineup struggled to deliver in the biggest spots. Mookie Betts went 0-for-4, Max Muncy was 0-for-3, Tommy Edman was 0-for-3, and Freddie Freeman went 0-for-4.
In his return, Ohtani went 1-for-4 with a walk and looked quite good at the plate in terms of approach. The Dodgers, as a group, made decent swing decisions, but they didn’t get the results they needed.
Yamamoto gave the club a chance to win. He was charged with four runs while he was in the game, allowing five hits and a walk. He struck out four and generated 12 swinging strikes, a sign that his stuff wasn’t at its usual level.
The biggest blow came on a two-run homer to Manny Machado, who made Yamamoto pay for a rare mistake in location. Even so, the Dodgers did enough on the mound and in the bullpen to keep this from becoming a runaway.
With 15 total baserunners, Los Angeles had more than enough traffic to make a better night of it. Instead, the offense let a winnable game slip away.
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