Dodgers’ pitchers roughed up for 5 home runs in loss to Nationals

LOS ANGELES — The Dodgers don’t always rely on the three former MVPs at the top of their lineup. They have managed to win nine of their past 13 games despite modest contributions from that trio, players like Andy Pages and Will Smith stepping up in big ways.

They could have used them Saturday night, though.

Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman went a combined 1 for 12 with six strikeouts in a 7-3 loss to the Washington Nationals.

The Dodgers’ only runs in the loss were solo home runs by Pages, Smith and Teoscar Hernandez, continuing a breakout season for Pages and another All-Star season for Smith.

But Ohtani was hitless in four at-bats, extending a 2-for-19 skid without an extra-base hit or a run scored in his past five games. He came up with runners on base twice Saturday and struck out both times.

After a heartening stretch from Betts following his return from a toe injury, he has slipped back into the doldrums – 5 for 33 over his past nine games.

Freeman has slipped from the top of the National League’s batting average leaderboard with his own 5-for-33 slump over his past nine games, with no extra-base hits and no RBIs in that stretch. He had the best chance of the trio to impact Saturday’s game in the fifth inning. He came up with runners on first and second against Nationals starter Jake Irvin but struck out.

Irvin struck out seven in his 5⅓ innings. Five of them were former MVPs.

It might not have mattered, given the way Dodgers pitchers gave up the longball Saturday – 2,035 feet worth in all.

Right-hander Dustin May continued his season-long trend of making just enough mistakes to color an otherwise positive outing. He pitched into at least the sixth inning for the eighth time in his 14 starts and gave up just five hits.

Three of them were home runs, however. He gave up a monstrous 451-foot blast to James Wood leading off the fourth inning and another solo home run to Luis Garcia Jr. on the next pitch.

Two innings later, Nathaniel Lowe got May for the first of his two home runs in the game. In between, Jack Dreyer gave up a two-run home run to C.J. Abrams, the first home run Dreyer has allowed in his major-league career (now 39 ⅔ innings old).