SAN DIEGO – When the Dodgers’ offense gets going, it really gets going.
The Dodgers broke open a tie game with a nine-run sixth inning featuring three home runs and routed the San Diego Padres 15-3 Saturday night.
The Dodgers have scored 34 runs while winning four of the first five games on this road trip – 27 of them in two games (Tuesday in Minnesota and Saturday in San Diego).
Kyle Tucker and Dalton Rushing hit back-to-back home runs in the big inning and Mookie Betts hit a three-run home run, his third consecutive game with a home run. Each of the nine starters in the Dodgers’ lineup scored a run during the sixth-inning eruption.
You couldn’t see it coming. The game was a 1-1 pitchers’ duel for the first five innings.
The Dodgers struck first with the help of some questionable outfield defense by the Padres.
Fernando Tatis Jr. made a diving attempt at Max Muncy’s line drive to right field and came up empty. The ball went past him for Muncy’s first triple of the season.
Tommy Edman followed with a fly ball to center field. Jackson Merrill seemed to underestimate how much the ball would carry and it went over his head, landing on the warning track and going for an RBI double.
The Dodgers did no more damage for a while. But Yoshinobu Yamamoto was pitching like he wouldn’t need it.
Yamamoto retired the first six Padres batters in order and gave up just two hits in the first four innings
His first pitch of the fifth, though, was a fat fastball down the middle that Gavin Sheets jumped on and sent 414 feet to straightaway center field, tying the game at 1-1.
That was the end of that.
Freddie Freeman started the decisive sixth inning with a double. He scored when Padres second baseman Will Wagner booted Muncy’s ground ball. Muncy scored when Edman lined a triple off the right field wall.
Tucker worked a nine-pitch at-bat against Randy Vasquez, hitting the final pitch on a line into the right field seats for his first extra-base hit since June 15. He was 5 for 26 in between but had two singles to go with his home run Saturday for his first three-hit game since June 3 and a season-high four RBIs.
Rushing got a 2-and-2 cutter over the plate and hit it into the seats for his home run and flipped the bat in obvious relief. Since Will Smith went out with a neck injury and Rushing stepped into the starting catcher’s role, he has gone just 10 for 52 (.192).
Two walks and a single loaded the bases for Freeman’s second time around. He drove in a run with a groundout and Betts followed with his home run to cap the inning.
Before the Dodgers piled on with four more runs in the eighth and another in the ninth, the Padres chipped away with single runs in the sixth and seventh innings. The seventh inning was the most troublesome for the Dodgers.
Kyle Hurt entered and retired the first batter he faced but then gave up two hits and walked two, leaving the bases loaded for Alex Vesia. In 8⅔ innings this month, Hurt has walked nine batters and given up 11 hits.