But he’s not sure he’s seen his club put together as many complete games, combining pitching, offense and defense, as it has during this current run, which continued with Wednesday’s 3-1 victory over the Miami Marlins before 40,702 in Chavez Ravine.
Teoscar Hernández drove in all three Dodgers runs with a first-inning RBI single and a tie-breaking two-run homer in the sixth, and Gavin Stone threw seven superb innings, giving up one run and six hits, striking out four and walking none, as the Dodgers won for the 14th time in 16 games and extended their win streak to seven.
The Dodgers have outscored opponents 100-31 and hit 28 homers during the 16-game stretch in which their pitchers have combined for a 1.74 ERA, giving up 28 earned runs in 145 innings.
They played another errorless game on Wednesday after entering with 23 defensive runs saved, according to Fangraphs, the third-best team total in the league behind Kansas City and Texas. The 1-hour, 55-minute game ended with second baseman Miguel Rojas charging a slow Jesus Sanchez grounder and making an accurate off-balance throw to first for the final out.
Dodgers starting pitchers have notched 11 quality starts and allowed just 23 earned runs in 94 ⅓ innings over their last 16 games, good for a 2.19 ERA.
The bullpen — after Michael Grove’s scoreless eighth inning and Daniel Hudson’s scoreless ninth for the save on Wednesday — has allowed just five earned runs over 50 ⅔ innings during the stretch, good for an 0.89 ERA.
“We’ve played some great baseball at times over the years, but this [stretch], from all facets of the game, is as good as I’ve seen,” Roberts said. “It’s hard to beat what we’ve done.”
The Dodgers took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first on Wednesday when Freddie Freeman reached on a two-out, broken-bat single to right-center field, took second on Marlins pitcher Ryan Weathers’ balk, third on a wild pitch and scored on Hernández’s RBI single to right field.
The Marlins tied the score 1-1 in the top of the fourth when Bryan De La Cruz lined an 88-mph hanging changeup from Stone into the left-field bullpen for a leadoff home run.
Jake Burger followed with an infield single, and Josh Bell flared a single to left field, but Stone escaped the two-on, no-outs jam by starting a 1-6-3 double play on Jesus Sanchez’s comebacker and striking out Nick Gordon swinging with a 96-mph fastball.
Stone, leaning heavily on a fastball that averaged 94.2 mph and a changeup that averaged 86.5 mph, retired eight batters in a row to open the game before giving up a two-out single to Otto Lopez in the third.
He responded to Miami’s run-scoring fourth inning by retiring the side in order in the fifth and allowing just two singles over a scoreless sixth and seventh. Stone is 3-0 with a 2.10 ERA in his last five starts, a stretch in which he has given up seven earned runs and 22 hits, struck out 16 and walked nine in 30 innings.
“He’s been very consistent with his command, his conviction, his confidence, and as a result, he’s gone deeper into games,” Roberts said. “He looks like a seasoned major league pitcher. He has that boyish face, but the demeanor on the mound, he’s a bulldog out there. It’s really fun to watch him.”
Hernández put Stone in line for the win when he followed another Freeman two-out hit, this one a double into the right-field corner in the sixth, with a towering two-run homer to left-center field for a 3-1 lead, giving Hernández 10 homers and a team-leading 29 RBIs on the season.