The Padres routed the Dodgers on their home field and L.A. returned the favor at Petco Park Wednesday.
Mookie Betts homered for the second straight night, Shohei Ohtani hit an RBI single and the Dodgers beat Dylan Cease and the Padres 8-0 to force a Game 5 in their National League Division Series.
“It’s win or go home,” Manny Machado said. “So, go out there and leave it on the field.”
Will Smith and Gavin Lux each hit a two-run homer for the Dodgers, who snapped a two-game losing streak and now return home for the decisive matchup between the NL West rivals at 5:08 p.m. Friday.
That’s not necessarily to the Dodgers’ benefit. The Padres won 10-2 at Dodger Stadium in Game 2 on Sunday, when tempers flared on the field and in the stands.
The winner will have home-field advantage in the National League Championship Series against the New York Mets, who eliminated the Philadelphia Phillies Wednesday in their NLDS.
The Dodgers, despite opting for a bullpen game, got a superb effort by opener Ryan Brasier and seven fellow relievers, holding the Padres to seven hits and extending their scoreless streak to 15 innings.
Evan Phillips, who got the win, retired Jurickson Profar, Machado and Jackson Merrill on five pitches in the sixth.
Xander Bogaerts managed two hits and a walk against the Dodgers, David Peralta added two knocks, and Fernando Tatis Jr. and Jake Cronenworth each had an extra-base hit, but the Padres never really managed to rally.
In addition, the Dodgers kept Tatis Jr. in the yard after he hit three homers in the first three games, including two on Sunday, for four overall this postseason. Brasier struck out Tatis in the first, the star’s first whiff in six playoff games.
The Petco Park-record crowd of 47,773 had hoped to see the Friars again eliminate the hated Dodgers in the NLDS.
With All-Star first baseman Freddie Freeman sidelined by a right ankle sprain, Betts and Ohtani needed to produce to keep LA’s season alive. They did just that, with Betts driving in two runs on two hits and Ohtani bringing in one run and reaching three times.
With the Dodgers up 5-0, the Japanese superstar was thrown out trying to score from second on Teoscar Hernández’s single in the fourth that caromed off third baseman Machado’s glove and hit umpire Mark Ripperger.
The defensive whiz circled around the ump, grabbed the ball and fired it to catcher Kyle Higashioka, who tagged Ohtani for the third out.
The Padres’ gamble to start Cease on short rest backfired. He got Ohtani to ground out to open the game before Betts homered on a full count. Cease put on two runners with one out in the second and was chased by Ohtani’s RBI single to right on his 38th pitch.
Cease seemed mystified, saying he had been comfortable and ready for the start.
“I liked the way the ball was coming out of my hand,” he said. “I really didn’t feel like I shot myself in the foot too much, which I feel like I’d been doing, so I felt good out there.”
Betts’ home run continued an ongoing storyline in the series.
He drove a 3-2 pitch into the Padres’ bullpen beyond the fence in left-center and raised his right index finger as he rounded first while Ohtani lifted his arms in celebration in the dugout.
Profar had robbed Betts of a home run Sunday and trolled the fans into thinking he missed it. That game later was stopped for 12 minutes after fans threw a baseball at Profar and trash onto the outfield.
On Tuesday, Betts homered to left but thought Profar had robbed him once again and turned toward the dugout before his teammates motioned that it was a homer.
The Dodgers haven’t named a starter for Game 5, but the Padres are expected to send Yu Darvish, who dominated L.A. in his Sunday NLDS start, to the mound – which pleases their star slugger.
“We got the right guy on the mound and we definitely have all the confidence in the world in him,” Machado said.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
