ANAHEIM — One massive swing from Shohei Ohtani, and there was a short sense of aid within the guests’ dugout at Angel Stadium.
However then issues swung again in the wrong way simply as shortly.
Ohtani took Angels nearer Kenley Jansen deep for a tiebreaking shot within the prime of the ninth inning, just for the Halos to tie the sport proper again up towards Alex Vesia within the backside half of the body. Ben Casparius was capable of strand the bases loaded to ship the sport to extras, however the Dodgers have been in the end walked off, 7-6, on Tuesday evening.
The Angels have taken the primary 5 video games of this season’s Freeway Collection. The Dodgers will ship Ohtani to the mound — the place he’ll pitch towards his former workforce for the primary time — as they attempt to keep away from a sweep within the season collection on Wednesday.
“Now it is a new season,” supervisor Dave Roberts mentioned. “You have a look at the standings, and we simply received to play higher baseball and discover methods to win video games.”
Whereas the Dodgers created loads of alternatives and have been capable of money in on some, in addition they left runs on the desk. They received on the board first on a Teoscar Hernández RBI single, however Max Muncy lined right into a double play with the possibility so as to add on within the first inning. Michael Conforto erased a leadoff baserunner by grounding right into a double play within the fourth and struck out with the bases loaded one inning later, after his workforce had knotted the sport at 5.
Pinch-hitter Miguel Rojas and Dalton Speeding opened the sixth with back-to-back singles, bringing Ohtani to the plate. However he lined a ball proper at Angels shortstop Zach Neto, who snagged it, stepped on second to double off Rojas and threw to first the place Speeding was tagged out to finish the play.
The subsequent time Ohtani got here as much as bat to guide off the ninth, he hit a ball out of attain of any participant on the sphere, crushing his NL-leading forty third homer of the season to proper subject to place the Dodgers in entrance. It snapped Jansen’s streak of 21 straight appearances with out permitting an earned run.
Ohtani grew to become the third participant within the enlargement period (since 1961) to hit right into a triple play and hit a go-ahead house run within the ninth inning or later of the identical sport, in line with the Elias Sports activities Bureau, becoming a member of Henry Rodriguez (Could 14, 2000) and Willie Davis (Could 30, 1962).
Of the trio, solely Davis’ house run stood because the profitable run.
“Huge hit proper there,” Roberts mentioned. “Clearly, you felt it within the dugout. After which the subsequent inning, they get a leadoff runner on base, after which the inning builds.”
Vesia has been the Dodgers’ steadiest reliever, however he was charged with the loss in every of his previous two outings. He had one other tough go of it within the ninth, permitting a leadoff single, issuing three walks (one intentional) and giving up the tying run on a sacrifice fly.
“The house run was nice. I felt actually good going into it,” Vesia mentioned. “It simply spiraled. It was the walks. Walks will kill you.”
After Casparius entered and struck out Taylor Ward with the bases loaded to ship the sport to extras, the Dodgers went down so as within the prime of the tenth. It did not take lengthy for the Angels to place the sport to mattress.
First Christian Moore laid down a sac bunt that stayed honest alongside the first-base line, permitting the automated runner to advance to 3rd. Then Adell adopted with a chopper over the left aspect of a drawn-in Dodgers infield, and it was over.
Over the previous month and alter, the Dodgers’ NL West lead dissipated from a season-high 9 video games on July 3 to their present tie with the Padres. All through this stretch, they’ve repeatedly expressed the necessity to play cleaner video games and discover methods to win, which they haven’t been capable of do with consistency for a while.
The way in which the Dodgers see it, Wednesday is one other probability to start getting again on monitor.
“It’s simply the way you climate it,” Freddie Freeman mentioned. “The way you reply and are available again the subsequent day. … See how we reply tomorrow. Shohei on the mound — so see if he can throw 9 innings and hit seven house runs.”
