Blast

It was Max Muncy’s night.

His third home run — a no-doubt-about-it 401-foot walk-off to right-center field, gave the Dodgers an 8-7 victory over the Texas Rangers on Friday at Dodger Stadium.

They improved to 10-3, winning despite closer Edwin Díaz’s first blown save as a Dodger.

Muncy’s first home runs, in the second and fourth innings, gave the Dodgers a 1-0 lead and then pulled them within a run, 3-2.

Those homers — Nos. 2, 3 and 4 this season — gave him 213 for his Dodgers’ tenure, tying and then surpassing Steve Garvey for third-most in the franchise’s Los Angeles history.

Muncy is only the second player in Dodgers history to have a walk-off homer as part of a three-home run game, joining Don Demeter, who accomplished the feat on April 21, 1959, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

Max Muncy hits a walk-off home run to cap his three-home run night in an 8-7 win over Texas.

It marked the second three-homer game of Muncy’s career and his 20th multi-homer game.

And they kept the Dodgers in a game that went back and forth, up and down, bobblehead style.

Andy Pages went three for three with four RBIs and had a go-ahead two-run double and a two-run home run to provide crucial insurance that kept his club in the game.

His double in the sixth — he smacked Robert Garcia’s 84-mph slider into right field to bring home Muncy and Teoscar Hernández — gave the Dodgers a 5-4 lead.

And Pages’ two-run home run to center field off Luis Curvelo in the eighth brought home Muncy, who had singled. It also brought his MLB-leading batting average to .449 — and wasn’t just icing on the cake but fortification against the Rangers’ hitters who wouldn’t quit.

After Dodgers’ starter Tyler Glasnow exited after pitching six innings and giving up four runs on five hits — including two home runs — while striking out seven, Alex Vesia and Tanner Scott both pitched a scoreless inning before closer Díaz entered in the ninth.

The Dodgers’ closer gave up a single to former Dodger Joc Pedersen and then a two-run home run to Evan Carter that cut the lead to 7-6. Then Ezequiel Duran singled in Sam Haggerty to tie the score.

The Dodgers made it interesting by playing from behind for the ninth time in 13 games: The Rangers quickly responded to Muncy’s first homer, taking a 3-1 lead in the third inning when former Dodger Corey Seager teed off for a 409-foot, three-run home run to center field.

Max Muncy hits a walk-off home run to lift the Dodgers to an 8-7 win over the Texas Rangers at Dodger Stadium on Friday night.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

(Back on June 12, 2024, in his only other game at Dodger Stadium as a member of the Rangers, Seager hit a three-run home run. That one was a go-ahead blast off Walker Buehler that gave Texas a 3-2 victory.)

In the fifth inning Friday, Wyatt Langford deposited a Glasnow curveball into the Dodgers’ bullpen; his first home run this season pushed Texas’ advantage to 4-2.

Shohei Ohtani then singled to right to move Freeland to third — and, notably, to extend his on-base streak to 44 games, the most ever for a Japanese-born player and the fourth-longest such streak in Dodgers history.

Ohtani has also reached base on all seven of his bobblehead nights.

This season, the Dodgers determined that they needed two games — Friday and July 8 — to honor Ohtani’s “Greatest Game” with the bobblehead treatment.

Max Muncy runs the bases after hitting his walk-off home run in the ninth inning against Texas on Friday night.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

On Friday, all 53,675 fans went home with a bobbling figurine of Ohtani at the plate, a memento honoring his performance in Game 4 of the NLCS last October. He not only pitched six shutout innings and struck out 10 in that 5-1 NLCS-clinching victory over the Milwaukee Brewers, but he also hit three home runs that traveled a combined 1,342 feet.

The Dodgers’ Miguel Rojas won’t take bereavement leave or travel back to his native Venezuela following the sudden death of his father, Miguel Rojas Sr., manager Dave Roberts said before the game.

“There’s a lot going on in Venezuela,” the Dodgers manager said. “And a lot of his family is kind of dispersed around the world, essentially. He just feels they’ve got a handle on it down there, so he’s going to stay with us.”

Freeze frame. There’s Dodgers catcher Will Smith’s follow-through as he watches the ball he just crushed travel toward the wall Saturday.

Now, split screen. Pull up an image of the bobblehead the Dodgers gave out before the game, commemorating Smith’s Game 7 World Series-winning home run. It’s a mirror image.

On his bobblehead night and 31st birthday, Smith delivered a two-run home run in the eighth inning as the Dodgers swept their season-opening series against the Arizona Diamondbacks with a 3-2 victory Saturday at Dodger Stadium.

Cue an aerial shot of the Hollywood sign.

“When you talk about big hits, clutch, Will’s right at the top of the list,” manager Dave Roberts said.

Roberts originally planned to sit Smith. The catcher played in the first two games of the series, and an off day on Sunday would have given him two straight days of rest early in a grueling season.

“We always talk about stuff,” Smith said. “He was going to give me the day off, I just kind of dropped the bobblehead card [for Saturday] and he let me in there.”

A key edit to the script.

Roberts made a few tweaks to the lineup ahead of the Dodgers facing a left-handed starter for the first time this season. Against Eduardo Rodriguez, Roberts swapped first baseman Freddie Freeman and Smith in the batting order; Smith hit fourth and Freeman fifth.

Santiago Espinal also made his Dodgers debut, starting at third base. Roberts said it wouldn’t be a platoon between Espinal and Max Muncy at third, but he wasn’t sure exactly how the playing-time split would play out.

For the first five innings, no one on the Dodgers did much on offense, except for Freeman.

Freeman went hitless in the first two games of the series despite making hard contact. But he had three hits in four at-bats Saturday, including a double in the sixth inning that drove in the Dodgers’ first run.

“Definitely nice to get off the barrel on the first one and hit a flare up the middle,” Freeman said. “And obviously once you get one, you can just kind of rest easy. And then they played the shift on my third hit, and that was nice, because then I was able to stay on the fastball and hit it to left field down the line.”

That hit cut the Diamondbacks’ lead to one run, thanks to a strong showing from the Dodgers’ pitching staff.

Dodgers pitcher Tyler Glasnow delivers during the first inning against the Diamondbacks on Saturday.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

Tyler Glasnow turned in a quality start. Holding the Diamondbacks to two runs over six innings, Glasnow used his curveball as his putaway pitch against right-handed hitters, and two-strike sinkers kept left-handed batters off balance, especially deeper into his start. Glasnow recorded six strikeouts.

The Dodgers’ bullpen continued its scoreless streak for the series, as Alex Vesia, Will Klein and Edwin Díaz shut down the Diamondbacks through the last three innings.

For the second straight night, Díaz entered to a live rendition of Timmy Trumpet’s “Narco,” performed by trumpet player Tatiana Tate.

“When Edwin comes in the game, that means something good’s happening for the Dodgers,” Freeman said. “So I’m a fan.”

Although the Dodgers’ offense was quieter than in their other wins of the series, their lineup again proved to be pesky. In all three games, they fell behind 2-0. In all three, they won.

Dodgers catcher Will Smith, left, celebrates with Tesocar Hernández after hitting a two-run home run in the eighth inning Saturday.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

With two outs in the bottom of the eighth inning Saturday, Mookie Betts drew a walk. Then Smith worked a 2-2 count, fouling off three fastballs before he was right on time for one at the top of the strike zone.

“We never feel like we’re out of it,” Smith said. “We keep taking good at-bats, keep believing in each other, keep believing that someone’s going to come up with a big hit.”

On Saturday, it was destined to be Smith.

“Birthday and bobblehead day,” Glasnow said, “It was a magical night.”

Roll credits.

Injury updates

Dodgers utility players Tommy Edman (right ankle surgery recovery) and Kiké Hernández (left elbow surgery recovery) took early batting practice on the field Saturday afternoon.

Roberts has said he expected Edman, on the 10-day injured list, will be an option by at least the end of May. Hernández will be eligible to be activated off the 60-day IL around the same time.

“I’d be shocked if [Hernández] wasn’t ready when that time is up,” Roberts said. “Taking grounders, the way he’s moving, the way he’s throwing, catching, the swing, ball coming off the bat. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think he was in the lineup tonight.”