But it provided a much-needed shot in the arm to a starting staff that has been ravaged by season-ending elbow injuries to Dustin May and Tony Gonsolin, Clayton Kershaw’s velocity-sapping shoulder injury, Walker Buehler’s aborted comeback from Tommy John surgery and Julio Urías’ recent arrest for domestic violence.
Lynn gave an overworked bullpen a respite with a 111-pitch effort in which he struck out three and walked two, and first baseman Freddie Freeman and catcher Will Smith provided the bulk of the offense to help the Dodgers reduce their magic number to clinch their 10th National League West title in 11 years to five games.
Freeman celebrated his 34th birthday in style with four hits and four runs, smacking a two-run home run in the third inning and his major league-leading and franchise record-extending 55th double to right field in the eighth. He now has 121 runs on the season, a career-high.
Smith doubled in the first, walked and scored in the third, cracked a three-run homer in the fourth and was hit by a pitch and scored in the seventh.
Lynn went 4-0 with a 2.03 ERA in his first five starts for the Dodgers after his July 28 trade from the Chicago White Sox but was rocked for 15 earned runs and 14 hits–six of them homers–in nine innings of his next two starts, losses to Atlanta and Miami.
“The last two starts were not good, and I think it was a wake-up call for Lance,” manager Dave Roberts said before the game. “Not that he needs one, but he takes it personally. He’s a pro, and I expect him to go out there and fill up the strike zone and make quality pitches and put us in a position to win.”
Lynn did just that despite serving up his major league-high 41st home run, a solo shot to Fernando Tatis Jr. in the fifth inning.
Lynn escaped a two-on, no-out jam in a 26-pitch first inning by getting Juan Soto to pop out to third, Manny Machado to fly to the warning track in right and striking out Xander Bogaerts on a full-count, 94-mph fastball.
Dodgers shortstop Kiké Hernández made a superb backhand snag of Tatis’ 111-mph one-hopper and fired to second baseman Mookie Betts to start a double play to end the third.
The Padres loaded the bases with no outs in the fourth on Soto’s double, Machado’s single and Bogaerts’ walk, but Lynn minimized damage by retiring Trent Grisham on an RBI fielder’s choice (a bunt to third), Matthew Batten on a fly to right and Brett Sullivan on a fly to left.
Dodgers center fielder James Outman made a nice running, diving catch of Jurickson Profar’s fly ball to shallow right-center field for the second out of the fifth to save a run, as Tatis followed with his solo shot to right-center to cut the Dodgers lead to 7-2.
(Mark J. Terrill / Associated Press)
Freeman jump-started the Dodgers offense with a single to center with one out in the first inning. He took third on Smith’s double to left and scored on Max Muncy’s sacrifice fly to center for a 1-0 lead.
Kiké Hernández led off the third with a single to right, and Freeman drove a one-out homer to left-center, his 26th of the season, for a 3-1 lead. Smith, Muncy and J.D. Martinez walked to load the bases, and David Peralta’s RBI fielder’s choice made it 4-1.
The Padres scored in the top of the fourth, but the Dodgers answered with three more runs in the bottom half of the inning, Hernández reaching on a one-out infield single, Freeman stroking a two-out single to right and Smith crushing a three-run homer to center–his first extra-base hit since Sept. 3 and first homer since Aug. 29–for a 7-1 lead.
The Dodgers tacked on two insurance runs in the seventh, loading the bases with no outs against reliever Nick Hernandez and scoring on Chris Taylor’s RBI single and Outman’s sacrifice fly off veteran left-hander Rich Hill, and two in the eighth on Martinez’s two-run single.
Kyle Hurt’s locker
The Dodgers promoted another prized pitching prospect from the minor leagues on Tuesday, recalling Kyle Hurt from triple-A Oklahoma City, and the 25-year-old right-hander shined in his big-league debut.
Hurt replaced Lynn to start the eighth inning and retired the heart of the Padres order–Tatis on a fly ball to center, Soto on a grounder to shortstop and Machado on a grounder to third. He then struck out the side–Garrett Cooper, Grisham and Batten–in the ninth.
The 6-foot-3, 240-pound Hurt, a Rancho Santa Fe native who played college ball at USC, had the highest strikeout rate in minor league baseball this season, going 4-4 with a 3.87 ERA, 145 strikeouts and 41 walks in 88 ⅓ innings over 25 games–16 of them starts–for double-A Tulsa and Oklahoma City.
Ranked the organization’s 12th-best prospect by MLB Pipeline, Hurt features a fastball that sits between 93-96 mph and touches 98 mph, a plus changeup, a tight slider and curve.
Hurt, who will provide length out of the bullpen, was a fifth-round pick of the Miami Marlins in 2020. He was acquired by the Dodgers along with left-hander Alex Vesia for reliever Dylan Floro before the 2021 season.