Bobby Witt Jr. and Adam Frazier each drove in two runs, Salvador Perez moved into second place on Kansas City’s career RBI list and the Royals beat the Angels 8-4 on Tuesday night, shortly after being eliminated from postseason contention.
The Royals (79-78) were knocked out of the race for an AL wild card with five games remaining in their regular season. Kansas City, which reached the playoffs last season, has failed to qualify for the postseason in nine of the last 10 seasons.
Perez singled to center in the first inning to score Witt. It was the 35-year-old catcher’s 97th RBI of the season and 1,013th of his career, moving him past Hal McRae. The Royals’ all-time RBI leader is George Brett with 1,596.
Maikel Garcia went three for four with two doubles. It was Garcia’s second career game with three hits and three runs scored, and his 11th three-hit game of the season.
Royals starter Cole Ragans (3-3) gave up two runs and three hits and struck out 10 over five innings in his second start since returning from the injured list with a left rotator cuff strain.
Bryce Teodosio hit his first career homer for the Angels in the fifth inning, in his 45th MLB game this season. Taylor Ward added his 35th homer, a career high, in the ninth inning. The Angels have lost 10 of their last 11 games.
Key moment
Mike Trout was honored before his first at-bat for hitting his 400th career home run against the Rockies in Colorado on Saturday.
Key stat
The Royals’ batters recorded 15 hits, and the pitchers recorded 13 strikeouts.
Up next
The Royals’ Stephen Kolek (5-6, 3.54 ERA) faces the Angels’ Yusei Kikuchi (6-11, 4.05) on Wednesday night.
DENVER — Kyle Freeland pitched six solid innings, Blaine Crim homered and drove in two runs, and the Colorado Rockies beat the Angels 3-1 on Sunday in their final home game of a miserable season.
Victor Vodnik got three outs for his 10th save as the Rockies improved to 43-113 with six games remaining, ensuring they won’t tie the 1962 New York Mets for the most losses in one season by a National League team since 1900. Those expansion Mets finished 40-120-1.
Mike Trout doubled leading off the game after hitting his 400th career home run Saturday night. He scored the only run for the Angels (70-86), who went 1-9 on their last road trip of the year.
Trout scored on Jo Adell’s single in the first but Freeland (5-16) was in control after that. He retired 13 of 14 batters before Taylor Ward’s leadoff single in the sixth. The left-hander issued his only walk one out later but ended his day by getting Logan O’Hoppe to ground into an inning-ending double play.
Angels starter Caden Dana (0-3) didn’t allow a hit through three innings, but three walks in the second allowed the Rockies to tie it on Kyle Karros’ sacrifice fly.
Crim’s leadoff homer in the fourth gave Colorado the lead, and Freeland and the bullpen made it stand up.
Crim added an RBI groundout in the eighth.
Key moment: The Angels had runners on first and third with one out in the first, but Freeland struck out O’Hoppe and Christian Moore to keep the damage at one run. Freeland had seven strikeouts.
Key stats: Colorado finished 25-56 at Coors Field, the most home losses in franchise history. The previous high was 46 in 2012.
Up next: The Angels host Kansas City on Tuesday to begin their final homestand. They had not announced a scheduled starter yet.
Trout reached the milestone in the eighth inning when he hit a 485-foot solo homer to left-center field off Rockies reliever Jaden Hill to extend the Angels’ lead to 3-0.
The three-time American League MVP had just one home run in his previous 36 games.
Taylor Ward and Nolan Schanuel also homered for the Angels, who snapped an eight-game losing streak. Ward’s home run was his 34th of the season, tying him for the 10th-most in the majors.
In his 300th career start, and his first since giving up a career-high nine earned runs in a Sept. 14 loss to the Seattle Mariners, Hendricks (8-10) allowed just three hits and struck out five batters with no walks. He has given up three or fewer earned runs in 13 of his past 18 starts.
Luis García earned his second save of the season after getting Jordan Beck to ground into a game-ending double play with the bases loaded.
Colorado starter Germán Márquez (3-15) pitched a strong game in which he gave up four hits and two earned runs while striking out five in a season-high seven innings.
Hunter Goodman had two of the Rockies’ five hits.
Angels star Mike Trout hits his 400th career home run in a 3-0 win over the Colorado Rockies.
Key moment: Ward’s solo homer in the second inning broke a scoreless tie and gave the Angels a lead they wouldn’t surrender.
Key stat: With his benchmark home run, Trout has a batting average of .400 with six homers and 12 RBIs in 15 career games at Coors Field.
Up next: Colorado LHP Kyle Freeland (4-16, 5.14 ERA) will take on a yet-to-be-announced Angels starter on Sunday in the finale of the three-game series.
DENVER — Brenton Doyle had a tying two-run single and scored the go-ahead run on Ezequiel Tovar‘s sacrifice fly in a four-run sixth inning as the Colorado Rockies beat the Angels 7-6 on Friday night.
Tyler Freeman had three hits including a double and Hunter Goodman had an RBI triple for Colorado, which snapped a five-game losing streak and improved to 3-14 in September.
Goodman’s first-inning triple brought Freeman across to start the scoring, and Blaine Crim brought in another on a sacrifice fly.
Christian Moore and Denzer Guzman both went deep in the second inning to bring the Angels ahead 3-2, but Freeman’s second hit of the game brought the tying run across for Colorado.
The Rockies bullpen combined for four innings of one-hit ball in relief of starter Bradley Blalock (2-5), who allowed eight hits and six earned runs while striking out four. Victor Vodnik earned his ninth save of the year.
Mitch Farris (1-2) took the loss in his fourth career start, allowing eight hits and seven runs with five strikeouts.
Key moment: After the Angels had a three-run fifth inning, the Rockies immediately answered with four runs, including two sacrifice flies.
Key stat: Hunter Goodwin’s 61 extra-base hits are the most in a single season by a Rockies primary catcher in franchise history. He is the third Rockies player since 2022 to have 60 or more extra-base hits in a season, joining Tovar (75, 2024) and C.J. Cron (60, 2022).
Up next: Angels RHP Kyle Hendricks (7-10, 5.01) faces Rockies RHP Germán Márquez (3-14, 6.73) in the second game of the three-game series.
A late scratch on Wednesday to catcher Will Smith, however, meant it would have to wait at least a couple more days.
Despite activating Tommy Edman from the injured list pregame, and proceeding to sweep the Colorado Rockies with a 9-0 win that stretched their National League West lead to three games, the Dodgers were left dealing with another injury headache Wednesday, removing Smith from the starting lineup just 15 minutes before first pitch after swelling developed around the bone bruise he has been dealing with in his right hand.
“Not overly concerned,” manager Dave Roberts said of Smith’s status, “but we’ve got to get that swelling under wraps.”
Smith’s absence hardly hampered the Dodgers in their fourth straight win.
Their lineup exploded for four runs in the second inning and five in the eighth behind a huge night from Mookie Betts, who continued his recent tear with a four-for-five, five-RBI performance that included a run-scoring double early and a grand slam to put things away late. Betts is now on a 16-game on-base streak, has multiple RBIs in five-straight contests, and is batting .352 with seven home runs and 26 RBIs over his last 32 games.
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ANGELS
Zach Neto hit a two-run homer, Mike Trout drove in two runs and the Angels beat the Minnesota Twins 4-3 on Wednesday.
Trout’s sacrifice fly in the eighth inning brought home Bryce Teodosio to give the Angels a 4-3 lead. Teodosio tripled off the top of the center-field wall, over the head of James Outman.
Trout also hit an RBI single in the third and scored on Neto’s homer off starter Taj Bradley to put the Angels ahead 3-1. It was Neto’s 26th home run of the year.
During the game’s first series, the lifelong fan saw No. 15 on the UCLA defense surge into the Nevada Las Vegas backfield. Morales wondered about the identity of this fast, feisty edge rusher and looked him up. It was Anthony Jones, a transfer from Michigan State.
Later, Morales watched No. 3 in coverage and commenced another search. It was defensive back Robert Stafford III, a transfer from Miami (Fla.).
Curious about the starting offensive linemen, Morales went back to his phone once more. He discovered a group that included three new starters in left tackle Courtland Ford and guards Eugene Brooks and Julian Armella — all transfers.
“I didn’t recognize any of the numbers,” Morales said.
Similar bewilderment was playing out in the San Diego living room of Ted Zeigler. Watching the game on his 65-inch television, the self-described hardcore Bruins fan also had the roster pulled up on his phone for ready reference, alternating between one screen and the other.
“This adds another dimension to watching the game that I wasn’t looking for,” Zeigler said. “I just feel disinterested.”
From Jad El Reda: The history of Mexican boxing features names that transcend generations. From Julio César Chávez, recognized as the pinnacle of Mexican boxing, to legendary figures such as Juan Manuel Márquez, Rubén ‘Púas’ Olivares, Salvador Sánchez, Ricardo ‘Finito’ López and Carlos ‘Cañas’ Zárate — all have proudly carried the name of Mexican flag to the peak of the boxing world.
The tradition of Aztec dominance has been continued in a big way by Saúl “Canelo” Álvarez, who on Oct. 29 will celebrate a historic 20-year professional career that began when he was just 15 years old, when he made his professional debut against Abraham González. Two decades later, with a legacy built on titles and big stages, Álvarez paused to reflect on his development from red-headed teenager who dreamed of being the best in the world to the current king of Mexican boxing with 63 victories.
Canelo Álvarez, left; UFC CEO Dana White, center; and Terence Crawford, right, speak during a news conference at at T-Mobile Arena on June 27. (David Becker / Getty Images for Netflix) “I’ve achieved everything in boxing, imagine how satisfying that is for me,” Álvarez told L.A. Times en Español during his training camp in Reno, Nev.
The celebration has already been planned and, like everything else involving Álvarez, it will be private but “on a grand scale.” The magnitude will likely depend on whether he emerges victorious when he defends his four belts against the undefeated Terence Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) Saturday (6 p.m., Netflix), at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.
1886 — The Mayflower defends the America’s Cup by beating Britain’s Galatea in two straight heats.
1937 — Don Budge beats Gottfried von Cramm in five sets to win his first U.S. Open men’s singles title. Budge wins 6-1, 7-9, 6-1, 3-6, 6-1.
1964 — ABC television cancels Fight of the Week, ending 18 years of regularly scheduled prime-time boxing on U.S. broadcast network television.
1976 — In the third race at Latonia, jockey John Oldham and his wife, Suzanne Picou, become the first husband and wife riding team to compete in a parimutuel race. Oldham finishes second aboard Harvey’s Hope and Picou rides My Girl Carla to an 11th-place finish.
1977 — In the last U.S. Open match played at the West Side Tennis Club in Forest Hills, New York, Guillermo Vilas beats Jimmy Connors, 2-6, 6-3, 7-6, 6-0, for the men’s singles title
1982 — Chris Evert wins her sixth U.S. Open singles title, defeating Hana Mandlikova, 6-3, 6-1.
1982 — In a 23-16 loss to Illinois, Rolf Mojsiejunko of Michigan State kicks a 61-yard field goal in his first collegiate attempt.
1983 — Pittsburgh running back Franco Harris runs for 118 yards in Steelers 25-21 win at Green Bay to become the only the third player in NFL history to rush for 11,000 yards.
1988 — Mats Wilander wins the longest men’s final in U.S. Open history, edging Ivan Lendl, 6-4, 4-6, 6-3, 5-7, 6-4.
1994 — Andre Agassi wins the U.S. Open with a three-set victory over Michael Stich and becomes the first unseeded player to beat five seeded players in a Grand Slam and the first unseeded champion since Fred Stolle in 1966. Andre wins 6-1, 7-6, 7-5.
1999 — U.S. Open Women’s Tennis: Serena Williams wins her first Grand Slam title; beats World #1 Martina Hingis 6-3, 7-6.
2001 — Sports comes to a standstill after terrorism in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, with Major League Baseball postponing a full schedule of regular-season games for the first time since D-Day in 1944.
2010 — James Madison, a top team in the Football Championship Subdivision, beats No. 13 Virginia Tech 21-16. The last time Virginia Tech lost to a I-AA team was 1985, when Richmond beat the Hokies 24-14 at Lane Stadium.
2010 — The Penn State women’s volleyball team has its record winning streak ends at 109 matches with a 28-26, 25-12, 25-18 loss to Stanford in a tournament at Florida. Penn State’s streak is the second-longest in Division I team sports, behind the 137 straight wins by the Miami men’s tennis program from 1957-1964.
2011 — Carolina’s Cam Newton becomes the first rookie to throw for more than 400 yards in his NFL opener in a 28-21 loss to Arizona. Newton, the No. 1 draft pick playing on the same field where he led Auburn to the BCS championship in January, completes 24 of 37 passes for 422 yards and two touchdowns with one interception.
2015 — Roberta Vinci stuns Serena Williams to end her Grand Slam bid in one of the greatest upsets in tennis history. The 43rd-ranked Italian wins 2-6, 6-4, 6-4 in the U.S. Open semifinals.
THIS DAY IN BASEBALL HISTORY
1912 — Eddie Collins set a major league record with six stolen bases for the Philadelphia Athletics in a 9-7 win over the Detroit Tigers. Collins stole six more in a game on Sept. 22.
1918 — The Boston Red Sox beat the Chicago Cubs 2-1 behind the three-hit pitching of Carl Mays to win the World Series in six games. This was Boston’s third championship in a four-year stretch — 1915, 1916 and this season.
1936 — Hod Lisenbee of the Philadelphia A’s tied a major league record for hits allowed, giving up 26 in a 17-2 rout by the Chicago White Sox.
1949 — The New York Yankees sent 18 men to the plate in the third inning of the first game of a doubleheader against Washington. In the 50-minute half-inning the Senators walked a major-league record 11 batters as the Yankees went on to a 20-5 win. New York won the second game 2-1 in one hour and 22 minutes.
1959 — The Dodgers beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 5-4, putting an end to reliever Roy Face’s 22-game winning streak. It was his only loss of the season as he finished with an 18-1 record.
1974 — It took the St. Louis Cardinals 25 innings — seven hours, four minutes — to beat the New York Mets. A record 202 batters went to the plate, Felix Millan and John Milner had 12 appearances apiece.
1985 — Pete Rose of the Cincinnati Reds became the all-time hit leader with his 4,192nd hit to break Ty Cobb’s record. Rose lined a 2-1 pitch off San Diego pitcher Eric Show to left-center field for a single in the first inning. It was the 57th anniversary of Ty Cobb’s last game in the majors.
1987 — New York Mets third baseman Howard Johnson, with 34 homers, became the first National League infielder to reach 30 home runs and 30 stolen bases in the same season. His 30th stolen base came in the fourth inning of a 6-4, 10-inning loss to the St. Louis Cardinals.
1996 — San Diego’s Ken Caminiti broke his own major league record by homering from both sides of the plate in a game for the fourth time this season. In a 6-5 win over Pittsburgh, Caminiti homered left-handed in the fifth inning, hitting a two-run shot. Batting right-handed in the seventh, he hit a solo shot to break his record set last year.
2008 — Albert Pujols drove in his 100th run with a sixth-inning double in the Cardinals’ 3-2 loss to the Cubs, becoming only the third player in major league history to reach the milestone in his first eight seasons. Pujols also extended his major league-record streak of reaching 30 homers and 100 RBIs in his first eight seasons, two more than any player in history.
2014 — Miami Marlins slugger Giancarlo Stanton sustained multiple facial fractures, dental damage and cuts that needed stitches after being hit in the face by a pitch. Stanton was hit under the left eye by a fastball from Milwaukee’s Mike Fiers in the fifth inning of a 4-2 loss.
2021 — Corbin Burnes and Josh Hader of the Milwaukee Brewers throw a combined no-hitter to beat the Cleveland Indians 3-0. It was the record ninth no-hitter of the season.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
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At some point, the Dodgers hope, they will be able to field a fully healthy lineup.
A late scratch on Wednesday to catcher Will Smith, however, meant it would have to wait at least a couple more days.
Despite activating Tommy Edman from the injured list pregame, and proceeding to sweep the Colorado Rockies with a 9-0 win that stretched their National League West lead to three games, the Dodgers were left dealing with another injury headache Wednesday, removing Smith from the starting lineup just 15 minutes before first pitch after swelling developed around the bone bruise he has been dealing with in his right hand.
“Not overly concerned,” manager Dave Roberts said of Smith’s status, “but we’ve got to get that swelling under wraps.”
Smith’s absence hardly hampered the Dodgers in their fourth straight win.
Their lineup exploded for four runs in the second inning and five in the eighth behind a huge night from Mookie Betts, who continued his recent tear with a four-for-five, five-RBI performance that included a run-scoring double early and a grand slam to put things away late. Betts is now on a 16-game on-base streak, has multiple RBIs in five-straight contests, and is batting .352 with seven home runs and 26 RBIs over his last 32 games.
Behind the plate, Ben Rortvedt filled in to catch Blake Snell’s scoreless six-inning, 11-strikeout start, which continued a dominant run from a Dodgers’ rotation that now has a 1.18 ERA over the last six games.
And thanks to a loss earlier in the day by the San Diego Padres, the team grew its lead atop the division for a second day in a row, effectively taking a 3-½ game NL West lead (when accounting for its head-to-head tiebreaker over San Diego) with 16 games to play.
“That was a big home series sweep, to get us going … get us moving in the right direction,” Snell said. “All of us have been looking forward to getting it going. This was a really good step.”
Yet, after activating Max Muncy off the injured list Monday, and welcoming Edman back into the fold Wednesday afternoon, the Dodgers were finally on the verge of having a full-strength squad for the first time since early July.
Instead, they were reminded of the tenuous reality of their oft-injured roster — and the difficulty of trying to manage Smith’s hand in particular.
It had only been a week since Smith first got hurt, when a foul ball in Pittsburgh ricocheted off his dangling throwing hand behind the plate and left him with a bone bruise that sidelined him until Tuesday — though didn’t require an injured list stint. Smith had looked OK in his return to action that night, lining a double in his first at-bat while helping Emmet Sheehan carry a no-hitter into the sixth. He was back in the original lineup the Dodgers posted Wednesday, as they sought a series sweep over the 106-loss Rockies.
The issue, it appeared, might be behind him.
But then, when the Dodgers emerged from the dugout Wednesday night, it was Rortvedt who went to squat behind home plate.
“Literally 15 minutes before the game, as he’s getting ready, his hand started to swell up,” Roberts said. “After [his pregame] hitting, getting dressed, getting ready for the game, that’s when it started to show itself. He tried to get out there and throw. It just didn’t respond well.”
After Smith first got hurt, Roberts cautioned his injury could linger for the rest of the season. After Wednesday, he said the team would monitor Smith on Thursday’s off day –– and potentially send him for an MRI –– then decide on Friday whether he’ll play in this weekend’s series-opener in San Francisco.
“We’ve got to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” Roberts said.
Miguel Rojas slides home to score a run in the second inning.
(Eric Thayer/Eric Thayer For The Los Angeles)
Smith’s hand won’t be the only injury the Dodgers (82-64) will have to manage down the stretch.
While Edman returned from an ankle injury that had plagued him all year, and sidelined him since its own flare-up on Aug. 3, Roberts said pregame he was still curious to see how the utilityman looked.
Edman slotted in center field on Wednesday — where he tracked down a fly ball on the game’s first pitch — and will likely see most of his playing time there for at least the foreseeable future. Roberts noted that, unlike earlier this year when Edman was mainly limited to infield duties, the quick reactions required at second base might be tougher on his ankle now.
“Getting off the ball is something I’m going to be really mindful of watching,” Roberts said of Edman. “Once he gets to full speed, it’s a lot easier [to decide what he can handle].”
With Edman in center, the Dodgers also ran out a new outfield alignment, with Andy Pages moving to left field and Michael Conforto dropping to the bench.
Roberts said Conforto will still see playing time against right-handed pitchers (the Rockies started left-hander Kyle Freeland on Wednesday). He also didn’t close the door on eventually flipping Pages (who had three hits Wednesday, including an RBI double in the second to open the scoring) and Teoscar Hernández (who went deep in the eighth for his third home run in the last two nights) in the corners, though noted he is keeping Hernández in right for now thanks to his improved defensive play in recent weeks.
“Teo played the season last year in left field, so we’ve shown that we can win a championship with him in left field,” Roberts said. “Not quite there yet, but thinking about it.”
Despite the moving pieces, it all brought the Dodgers closer to the lineup they envisioned having at the start of this season, the one they’ve floundered with offensively (entering the night ranked just 26th in the majors in scoring since July 4) while playing without.
“I think that we’ve all been waiting for our guys to come back to health and see what we look like,” Roberts said.
Still, they won’t be at full strength again until Smith is. Wednesday was a reminder that his health remains in doubt.
Roberts said that could include finding the rookie right-hander, who finally rediscovered his 100-mph fastball Tuesday after lacking velocity and battling a shoulder injury previously this year, an opportunity to start a big-league game for the first time since April. Or, potentially pitching out of the bullpen, which is how the 23-year-old would likely be used if he were to be included on the postseason roster.
Before that latter scenario could become reality, of course, the Dodgers will need to see Sasaki have some sort of success back in the majors, where he had a 4.72 ERA in eight starts at the beginning of the season before going on the IL.
Nonetheless, Roberts described Sasaki’s rehab outing on Tuesday as “great for the Dodgers, great for Roki’s confidence, great for the organization.
“Mostly it was great for Roki,” Roberts added. “Just to really let it eat, let it fly, have some success and know that he can be the guy that he’s known to be.”
It was picture day at Dodger Stadium on Tuesday, one of those quaint baseball traditions that has endured long past its usefulness.
So the team set up three rows of aluminum risers in shallow center field and the players, wearing impossibly white uniforms, filed out of the clubhouse just before 3 p.m., passing up batting practice to pose for the cameras. For a sport that thrives on routine, the afternoon had a unique last-day-of-school vibe.
“It’s a weird day,” manager Dave Roberts agreed.
But picture day also serves to bring the end of the season into tighter focus since it usually happens in the final three weeks. And the players who climb those risers are the ones who will decide the team’s postseason fate.
That was especially true for the Dodgers, who rode another splendid pitching performance — this one from Emmet Sheehan — to a 7-2 victory over the Colorado Rockies. Sheehan, bidding for a spot in the playoff rotation, was backed by four homers, including a pair of solo shots from Teoscar Hernández, who had his first three-hit night in more than a month.
The win, the team’s third in a row, coupled with San Diego’s loss to Cincinnati, expanded the Dodgers’ lead in the National League West to two games over the second-place Padres with just 17 left to play.
“It’s getting down to the wire,” Roberts said.
The Dodgers’ starting pitching is already in postseason form, posting a 1.41 ERA over the past five games. On Tuesday it was Sheehan’s turn on the mound and he set down the first 15 Rockies in order, becoming the third Dodger starter in four games to take a no-hitter into the sixth inning.
He wound up scattering three hits and a walk over seven innings, striking out nine to earn his fourth victory in five decisions. The win was also Sheehan’s fourth victory in as many appearances against Colorado.
Roberts said his team’s starting pitchers are all competing to one-up each other, giving the significance of the games now.
“They’re feeding off one another,” he said. “The pitchers are of the mind that these are very, very important games. It’s kind of the playoff mentality. The catchers are calling games in that vein.
“The defense has been really focused getting off the baseball. There’s a heightened level of focus across the board.”
That even spread to the offense, said Mookie Betts, whose two-run home run in the third extended his streak of reaching base safely to 15 straight games.
Mookie Betts is very happy after his two-run homer in the third inning.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
“It’s really neat being on this side,” Betts, who had multiple RBIs for a fourth straight game, said of watching the Dodger pitchers work. “If you kind of take a step back and look at it, there’s a lot of teams that would ask for something like this. Those guys give us opportunity to win every day.
“It’s really important for us as on the offensive side not to take that for granted.”
Although the Dodgers entered Tuesday second to last in the majors with an average of 3.14 runs a game in September, against Colorado starter Germán Márquez (3-13), whose ERA (6.31) looks more like a mortgage rate, they ran out to a 5-0 lead after five innings. As a result the focus turned to Sheehan, who needed just 59 pitches to cruise through five perfect innings, striking out five.
“I probably knew,” Sheehan, pitching on the 60th anniversary of Sandy Koufax’s perfect game, said when asked if he was aware he was more than halfway to matching that. “But I was definitely not thinking about it.”
The right-hander said he tried to cross up the Rockies by moving away from his fastball and going with a slider to the glove side instead.
“I felt like I was executing the slider pretty well,” he said. “The more I throw it, the easier it gets to get it to that spot. It’s an important pitch for me.”
Kyle Karros ended the suspense when he lined Sheehan’s first pitch of the sixth inning over a leaping Max Muncy at third for a single. Two more singles brought Karros around to score, ending the shutout as well.
Still Sheehan (6-3) was more than good enough to win for the fourth time in five decisions, lowering his ERA to 3.32 and forcing his way into the conversation over a role on the postseason roster.
“He’s unflappable,” Roberts said. “He knows he’s talented and he knows how to execute pitches. He’s got good stuff. No moment is too big for him. So I can’t speak to what role, but I know that he’s a viable option for us now and going forward.”
Tuesday’s win also left Sheehan unbeaten on picture day, something he nearly skipped as the scheduled starting pitcher.
“I wasn’t going go out there,” he said. “But I was like, I missed the last two. I gotta be out there.”
Years ago, when Don Drysdale and Sandy Koufax were at the top of the Dodgers’ pitching rotation, Drysdale missed a game to attend to some personal business. Koufax pitched a no-hitter that day.
When told about the achievement, Drysdale had one question: “Did he win?”
That’s a fair question for the current Dodgers pitching staff as well. Because Monday, for the second time in three days, the Dodgers took a no-hitter into the ninth inning.
They lost the first one. And while they won the second, it wasn’t easy with the Colorado Rockies bringing the tying run to the plate three times before Tanner Scott got the last out to preserve a 3-1 win at Dodger Stadium.
The victory kept the Dodgers a game ahead of the San Diego Padres in the National League West with 18 games left in the regular season.
It was Tyler Glasnow who flirted with history Monday, pitching seven hitless innings before turning the game over to relievers Blake Treinen and Scott. On Saturday, a similar scenario unfolded when Yoshinobu Yamamoto came within an out of a no-hitter against the Baltimore Orioles before giving up a home run to Jackson Holliday.
He left at that point, only to see Treinen and Scott give up three more runs in a 4-3 Dodger loss.
So when Scott gave up a double to Ryan Ritter to start the ninth — ending the no-hitter and drawing boos from those who remained from the crowd of 48,433 — manager Dave Roberts said he hoped he wasn’t witnessing déjà vu all over again.
“I try to not think like that,” he said.
Given how the Dodgers bullpen has struggled recently, it was hard not to.
Scott, however, quickly settled down, retiring the next two batters on soft grounders before Hunter Goodman lined out to Max Muncy at third to end the game and give Glasnow (2-3) his first win since March.
It was a victory that was long overdue.
Glasnow pitched six no-hit innings his last time out only to wind up with the loss when the Dodgers (80-64) failed to score behind him. That’s become an all-too-common problem for Glasnow, who has the second-lowest ERA in the Dodgers rotation but has received the weakest support with an average of 3½ runs per start.
Mookie Betts hits a two-run single in the seventh inning during the Dodgers’ 3-1 win over the Rockies on Monday.
(Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)
The Dodgers’ hitters didn’t even match that modest number Monday. But when Mookie Betts delivered a two-run single in the seventh, breaking a 1-1 tie, it left Glasnow in position for the win.
“It’s always good to score runs,” he said with a smile.
Smiles have been hard to come by after Glasnow’s starts. In only three of his 15 starts have the Dodgers trailed by more than a run when he has exited the game. Yet in five of those starts, the Dodgers didn’t even score a run behind him, which explains why he went more than 160 days between wins.
“It is what it is,” he shrugged. “But yeah, they put some at bats together, and we ended up winning.”
Glasnow, who was held out of his last scheduled start with a sore back, was pitching for the first time in 10 days and was strong from the start, striking out the side in the first — although he needed 18 pitches to do it. He fanned the side again in the sixth, but in between he gave up a second-inning run on Jordan Beck’s leadoff walk, a stolen base and two long outs, the second Kyle Farmer’s sacrifice fly to the left-field wall.
What he didn’t give up was a hit. Glasnow said he was aware he had a no-hitter as the game progressed, but he also knew he probably wouldn’t be allowed to finish it.
“My pitch count was pretty high,” said the right-hander, who finished with a season-high 105, striking out 11 and walking two. “I don’t know how many pitches I was going to be allowed to throw.”
Also working against him were his two stints on the injured list this season and his recent back issues.
“Obviously I want to stay in, no matter what my pitch count is,” he said. “[But] given my, like, track record, I kind of understand why. I respect the decision.”
For five innings, Colorado starter Chase Dollander, who came in 2-12 with a 6.77 ERA, nearly matched Glasnow. The Dodgers didn’t get their first baserunner until the third inning and didn’t have a hit until the fifth, when Michael Conforto led off with a single to left.
Dodgers starter Tyler Glasnow delivers in the fifth inning Monday against the Rockies.
(Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)
Dollander faced just three batters over the minimum before leaving with an apparent injury after walking Ben Rortvedt to start the sixth. Reliever Juan Mejia walked the first batter he faced and an out later Freddie Freeman bounced a high-hopper over Farmer and down the right-field line for a tying double.
An inning later the Dodgers scored two more off Angel Chivilli (1-5) to go in front. With two out and a runner on first, Shohei Ohtani doubled to right to bring Betts to the plate. After falling behind 0-2, he picked out a belt-high slider and drove it into the center to break the tie.
With the Dodgers safely in front and Glasnow out of the game, the drama turned to the no-hitter. There have been 22 combined no-hitters in major league history, with the last one by the Dodgers coming against the Padres in Monterrey, Mexico, in 2018.
That appeared in reach when Treinen breezed through the eighth. But Ritter, the Rockies’ No. 9 hitter, one-hopped the wall in left on Scott’s second pitch of the ninth. The ball appeared catchable off the bat, but Alex Call, inserted for defensive purposes, turned the wrong way, costing him any chance to make a play.
Scott retired the side on two ground outs and a liner to Muncy before celebrating with Rortvedt, who was called up from the minors Thursday and has come within four outs of catching two no-hitters in his first three starts.
“It’s not me, it’s these guys,” he said. “I’m doing my homework as much as I can, trying to be prepared. The pitchers are prepared. It’s just the fruit of that labor at that point.
From Kevin Baxter: When the Dodgers arrived in Colorado on Sunday night they had a golden opportunity to pad their narrow division lead against with the worst team in the majors. Unfortunately, even with Thursday’s 9-5 win over the Rockies, the Dodgers only managed a split of the four-game series.
They now head to San Diego for a crucial three-game-series against the Padres with the division lead once again up for grabs.
“I wish we had won all four, but it just didn’t happen,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “That’s just the way baseball is. So we’ve got to go out there and regardless of the standings, we’ve got to beat those guys.”
The standings, however, loom large. The margin over the Padres is just a game.
The Dodgers will have a bit of momentum on their side after scoring 20 runs on 30 hits in the two wins at Coors Field. Thursday’s matinee saw four players finish with multiple hits, including third baseman Alex Freeland, who was a career-best three for five with a run scored and another driven in. Freeland had six hits in the final three games in Denver.
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From Ben Bolch: Demetrice Martin built an early, practically insurmountable lead.
Landing six defensive backs by Christmas, the UCLA secondary coach added two more before the spring transfer portal window closed, making this race appear to be a runaway.
Before long, a formidable challenger emerged. Closing fast in the battle to become the Bruins’ top recruiter on an almost entirely new coaching staff was Andy Kwon.
Having helped snag four transfers — a few of whom committed before his hiring — the offensive line coach went on to secure verbal commitments from two four-star high school prospects from Florida, the kind of highly coveted out-of-region talent that UCLA had seen go elsewhere in recent years.
The heated duel to see who could secure the best players, which included every new assistant and holdovers Ikaika Malloe and Jerry Neuheisel, was a welcome surprise to coach DeShaun Foster.
From Ryan Kartje: Rising star USC wideout Ja’Kobi Lane suffered a broken foot in May, but was fully cleared this week and will be ready for the Trojans’ season opener against Missouri State, coach Lincoln Riley said Thursday.
The foot injury kept Lane limited through most of the summer. By the start of preseason camp, he was still being brought along slowly. During the portion of USC’s practices open to reporters, Lane wasn’t even running routes on air.
Lane wasn’t deemed fully healthy until the final week of USC’s preseason camp. Riley said that the junior wideout had actually “progressed a little bit ahead of schedule.”
From Gary Klein: As Matthew Stafford got to the podium on Thursday, he joked that he was sure reporters wanted to ask him questions about the paper cut he suffered.
The Rams star quarterback then fielded inquiries about the subject that clouds all conversation about the Rams: The back injury that sidelined Stafford until this week.
Stafford practiced for the fourth day in a row, another small milestone for the 17th-year pro and a team aiming to make a Super Bowl run.
“The good thing is I feel pretty good,” said Stafford, who practiced for the fourth day in a row. “The last couple days out there practicing, I was able to do even more than I thought I was going to be able to do the first day, and then I’ve just been trying to stack days.
1851 — The United States wins the first international yacht race. The schooner named “America” beats 14 British yachts.
1885 — Richard Sears beats Godfrey M. Brinley, 6-3, 4-6, 6-0, 6-3 to win the U.S. men’s national tennis championship held at the Newport (R.I.) Casino.
1898 — Malcolm Whitman beats Dwight F. Davis, 3-6, 6-2, 6-2, 6-1 to win the U.S. men’s national tennis championship held at the Newport (R.I.) Casino.
1948 — The Chicago Cardinals beat the College All-Stars 28-0 in front 101,220 fans at Chicago’s Soldier Field.
1949 — The Philadelphia Eagles beat the College All-Stars 38-0 at Chicago’s Soldier Field. It’s the largest shutout in the series, later matched by Green Bay in 1966.
1950 — Althea Gibson becomes the first Black tennis player to be accepted in competition for the national championship.
1957 — Floyd Patterson knocks out Pete Rademacher in the sixth round to retain his world heavyweight title at Sicks Stadium in Seattle.
1984 — Evelyn Ashford sets the world record in the 100-meter dash with a clocking of 10.76 seconds in a meet at Zurich, Switzerland.
1987 — Brazil snaps the 34-game winning streak of the U.S. men’s basketball team with a 120-115 victory in the Pan Am Games. Oscar Schmidt scores 46 points to lead Brazil. Cuba wins a record 10 of 12 gold medals in boxing and beats the U.S. 13-9 in the baseball final.
1999 — Jenny Thompson breaks Mary T. Meagher’s 18-year-old 100-meter butterfly record at the Pan Pacific swim championships. Thompson with a time of 57.88 seconds lowers the mark of 57.93 set by Meagher.
2004 — American sprinter Justin Gatlin wins the coveted Olympic 100m gold medal in Athens in 9.85 ahead of Francis Obikwelu of Portugal & American Maurice Greene.
2008 — Usain Bolt helps Jamaica win the 400-meter relay final in 37.10 seconds for his third gold medal and third world record of the Beijing Games. Bolt becomes only the fourth man, and the first since Carl Lewis in 1984, to win all three Olympic sprint events. Bryan Clay wins the decathlon, the first American to win the 10-discipline event at the Olympics since Dan O’Brien at Atlanta in 1996.
2018 — Ohio State suspends football coach Urban Meyer three games for mishandling repeated professional and behavioral problems of an assistant coach, with investigators finding Meyer protected his protege for years through domestic violence allegations, a drug problem and poor job performance.
2018 — The NCAA ditches the RPI for its own evaluation tool to select teams for the NCAA Tournament. The NCAA Evaluation Tool will rely on game results, strength of schedule, game location, scoring margin, net offensive and defensive efficiency and quality of wins and losses. NET will be used for the 2018-19 season by the committee that selects schools and seeds the tournament.
THIS DAY IN BASEBALL HISTORY
1917 — Pittsburgh’s Carson Bigbee set a major league record — since tied — with 11 at-bats in a 22-inning game against Brooklyn. Pirate Elmer Jacobs pitched 16 2-3 innings in relief. The game was also the fourth consecutive extra-inning game by the Pirates for a total of 59 innings, a National League record.
1934 — Pitcher Wes Ferrell hit two home runs to give the Boston Red Sox a 3-2 triumph over the Chicago White Sox in 12 innings. Trailing 2-1, Ferrell hit a home run in the eighth inning to tie the score and with two out in the 12th, Ferrell connected again for the game-winner.
1961 — Roger Maris, en route to his 61-home run season, became the first player to hit his 50th homer in August. He connected off California pitcher Ken McBride in a 4-3 loss to the Angels.
1965 — In the third inning of a game against the Dodgers, pitcher Juan Marichal of the San Francisco Giants hit catcher John Roseboro of the Dodgers in the head with his bat. A 14-minute brawl ensued and Roseboro suffered cuts on the head. Marichal thought Roseboro threw too close to his head when returning the ball to Sandy Koufax.
1971 — The Oakland Athletics opened and closed the game with solo homers to beat the Boston Red Sox 2-1. Boston pitcher Sonny Siebert gave up both, Bert Campaneris lead off the game and Reggie Jackson ended it with two out in the ninth inning.
1984 — New York Mets right-hander Dwight Gooden, at 19, fanned nine San Diego Padres to become the 11th rookie to strike out 200 batters in one season.
1989 — Nolan Ryan of the Texas Rangers became the first pitcher to strike out 5,000 batters. Ryan struck out 13, walked two and allowed only five hits in a 2-0 loss to Oakland. Ryan began the night needing six strikeouts and fanned Rickey Henderson swinging, leading off the fifth inning, for the record.
1999 — Mark McGwire became the first player to hit 50 homers in four consecutive seasons, hitting Nos. 49 and 50 in the first game of a doubleheader against the New York Mets.
2007 — The Texas Rangers became the first team in 110 years to score 30 runs in a game, setting an American League record in a 30-3 rout of the Baltimore Orioles in the first game of a doubleheader. It was the ninth time a major league team scored 30 runs, the first since the Chicago Colts set the major league mark in a 36-7 rout of Louisville in a National League game on June 28, 1897.
2012 — Oakland A’s P Bartolo Colon is suspended for 50 games for testing positive for testosterone, eight days after Giants OF Melky Cabrera was also suspended for using the same performance-enhancing substance.
2016 — Adrian Gonzalez hit three of the Dodgers’ seven homers — driving in a career-high eight runs — to lead Los Angeles to an 18-9 win over the Cincinnati Reds.
2021 — Miguel Cabrera of the Detroit Tigers becomes the 28th player to hit 500 home runs with a solo home run off of Steven Matz of the Blue Jays.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
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DENVER — When the Dodgers arrived in Colorado on Sunday night they had a golden opportunity to pad their narrow division lead against with the worst team in the majors. The best they could do was hold serve, needing Thursday’s 9-5 win over the Rockies to earn a split of the four-game series.
Now they head to San Diego for a crucial three-game series against the Padres with the division lead once again up for grabs.
“I wish we had won all four, but it just didn’t happen,” Dodger manager Dave Roberts said. “That’s just the way baseball is. So we’ve got to go out there and regardless of the standings, we’ve got to beat those guys.”
The standings, however, loom large. On July 7, the Dodgers led the division by six games. The margin is now just a game.
The Padres, who have won 12 of 19 games in August, are the third-hottest team in the National League this month. The Dodgers are a game over .500.
“It is what it is,” Roberts said. “It’s where we’re at right now and I can’t change it. I feel good about our club going into San Diego.”
His club will have a bit of momentum on its side after scoring 20 runs on 30 hits in the two wins at Coors Field. Thursday’s matinee saw four players finish with multiple hits, including third baseman Alex Freeland, who was a career-best three for five with a run scored and another driven in. Freeland had six hits in the final three games in Denver.
“It’s just like I’m building confidence now,” said Freeland, who entered Thursday hitting .180 since his call-up from Triple A Oklahoma City three weeks ago. “I’ve kind of spent a little time here now and I’m getting comfortable.”
The Dodgers also got a fourth straight strong effort from starter Clayton Kershaw (8-2), who gave up three runs in 5 2/3 innings. Kershaw has allowed just five runs over 23 2/3 innings this month, dropping his season ERA nearly 50 points to 3.13.
That was also good enough to keep his team in first, something he noted afterward.
Fans applaud as Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw heads to the dugout after being pulled from the mound in the sixth inning Thursday.
(David Zalubowski / Associated Press)
“You can’t take anything for granted in Colorado, obviously,” he said. “But at the end of the day, we’re [one] up going in [to San Diego]. So we feel good about it.”
Freeland agreed.
“We definitely could have produced more. But you know what? We’re going to take this one today and take this momentum and bring it into San Diego,” he said.
After Kershaw won the opener of a three-game series with the Padres at Dodger Stadium a week ago, the teams were even atop the N.L. The Dodgers wound up sweeping that series and have won eight of 10 with the Padres overall this year.
“We’ve played well against those guys this year,” Roberts said. “They’re going to give us everything they have this weekend.”
The Dodgers got started early Thursday with Mookie Betts, who reached base four times, opening the game by walking on five pitches. Freddie Freeman followed with a two-run home run, his 16th of the season, to center field.
The Rockies cut the lead in half in the bottom of the inning on a popup that got lost in the sun, a sacrifice bunt, a balk and an RBI groundout. But they would get no closer, with the Dodgers scoring in each of the first five innings to take an 8-2 lead.
Freeland had his first career triple along with a double and single, falling a homer shy of the cycle. He had six hits in the final three games in Denver. Betts finished two for three with two walks and two runs scoring while Freeman, who was two for five, raised his season average to .304 and is hitting .328 for August.
Notes: Roberts said pitcher/designated hitter Shohei Ohtani is fine after taking a line drive off his right thigh in Wednesday’s game. Ohtani was scheduled to have Thursday off and Roberts said he’ll be back in the lineup Friday. … The Dodgers will activate reliever Tanner Scott before Friday’s game in San Diego and reliever Kirby Yates on Saturday. Scott has been out a month with inflammation in his left elbow while Yates has missed three weeks with lower back pain. … Right-hander Roki Sasaki made progress in his second rehab start Wednesday, going 3 1/3 innings and giving up two runs (one earned) on three hits. He walked three and struck out two before leaving after 60 pitches. He will make another rehab start next week before the Dodgers make any decision on his role in September. The team had talked about using Sasaki in a relief role.
DENVER — Mookie Betts was the first Dodgers position player out on the field Tuesday, walking to a spot near the third-base foul line and kneeling on a mat before a coach, who began hitting soft ground balls to his right and left.
It’s a drill Betts does regularly to improve his defense. Betts’ defense, however, really isn’t a problem for the Dodgers.
A six-time Gold Glove winner in right field, Betts moved to shortstop full-time this season, turning his old position over to Teoscar Hernández. And his defense has been a problem. But Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said he isn’t planning any changes to his lineup for the time being.
“Are we playing our best defensive lineup? No,” Roberts said. “But I would say there’s very few teams in the big leagues playing their best defensive lineup every night. Even in a postseason race, you’ve still got to score.”
The Dodgers are definitely in a postseason race and Hernández absolutely helps them score, ranking second on the team in home runs (20) and RBIs (75) after going two for five with a run and an RBI in Tuesday’s 11-4 rout of the Colorado Rockies. He also made two nice running catches.
But then the Dodgers didn’t need much defense Tuesday, pounding out 18 hits with every player in the lineup reaching base as least once. Newcomer Alex Call led the way with a career-high four hits, including a home run and a double, scoring three runs and driving in two others while falling a triple shy of the cycle.
“I wasn’t thinking about it. I was really just trying to get on base another time,” Call, who struck out in his final at-bat in the eighth, said of the cycle. “But everybody else in the dugout was like, ‘if you hit this ball, you better keep running.’ It would have been fun to find a gap and see what would happen.”
The homer, a 453-foot blast in the second, was the longest by a Dodger this season. Yet Call still managed to get the ball back as a souvenir.
“I actually had some some friends in the stands that flew out from Wisconsin, and they tracked down the ball for me,” he said.
The homer helped Call snap out of terrible slump. He entered the game hitting .174 since coming over from Washington at the trade deadline, which wasn’t the kind of introduction he had hoped to have with this new team.
“I wanted to make a good impression. But I think you make a good impression by just showing how you work and showing how you play the game and just trusting in yourself to do what you do,” he said. “I would tell myself, ‘I’m just calibrating.’
“There’s a lot of moving parts, a lot of new things going on. New coaches, new teammates, new situation, new city. You can go on. So it’s a lot.”
Freddie Freeman, Will Smith, Betts and Miguel Rojas joined Hernández and Call with multiple hits for the Dodgers, who scored eight of their 11 runs with two out.
“Really, really pleased with tonight,” manager Dave Roberts said. “You saw a different ball club tonight.”
And a different Call as well.
“It’s certainly a big adjustment, especially when you walk into a clubhouse like ours,” Roberts said. “Coming from the Nationals, a bunch of young players, and you see our ball club in contention and trying to kind of figure out where you where you stand, right? He’s likable the way he plays, practices, and it was good to see him have some success.”
The Dodgers led 7-0 before the Rockies had their second baserunner, with one of those runs coming on Shohei Ohtani’s 44th home run of the season. That made it easy for starter Emmet Sheehan (4-2), who matched a career high by going six innings, striking out a season-best seven batters to earn the win.
“We just got on the board early,” Freeman said. “When you score runs, you want to keep it going as an offense.
“[But] I don’t think anybody’s going to think about how good we did today tomorrow. Every day is a new day. We’ll go out there and give it all again.”
Etc….
Reliever Kirby Yates walked one and struck out one in a one-inning rehab appearance for Oklahoma City on Tuesday. He threw 21 pitches, 13 for strikes. Yates went on the injured list Aug. 1 with lower back pain.
DENVER — Mookie Betts was back at shortstop and Teoscar Hernández remained in right field for the Dodgers on Tuesday, a day after two questionable fielding plays in the outfield led to two runs in a 4-3 walk-off loss to the last-place Colorado Rockies.
Hernández’s defense has increasingly become a matter of concern for manager Dave Roberts and Monday’s loss was followed by a meeting involving Roberts; Andrew Friedman, the Dodgers president of baseball operations; and Betts, who has expressed a willingness to move back to right field where he was a six-time Gold Glove winner.
Hernández is ranked 64th among National League right fielders with a defensive WAR of -0.4 and his two errors are tied for fourth-most in the league.
“He’s got to get better out there. There’s just no way to put it,” Roberts said after Monday’s game of Hernández. “It’s not a lack of effort. But, you know, we’ve just got to kind of get better. We do.”
Betts, meanwhile, twice led the American League in fielding average and putouts as the Boston Red Sox’s right fielder. But he’s played shortstop full-time this season.
“Defense is a big part of postseason baseball and winning baseball,” Roberts said.
Betts’ move to the infield has arguably weakened the Dodgers in two ways: Hernández’s defense and Betts’ offense. Playing the infield, especially shortstop, is far more taxing mentally than playing in the outfield and Betts is slashing a career-low .242/.312/.370 this season.
Moving Betts back to right field would likely mean using Alex Freeland or Miguel Rojas at shortstop, at least in the short term. Freeland played nearly 300 games at shortstop in the minors while Rojas has played more than 940 games there in the majors.
Hernández, second on the team with 74 RBIs and tied for second with 20 home runs, would then move to left field — a less-demanding position defensively than right field — in place of Michael Conforto, whose .190 batting average is the worst in the majors among players with at least 300 at-bats.
Moving Betts back to the outfield could be easier for Roberts when utility players Tommy Edman, Hyeseong Kim and Kiké Hernández return from the injured list, giving the manager more depth and flexibility. Kim, who will begin a rehab assignment this week, is the furthest along and could be back by early next week.
From Kevin Baxter: The half-empty Dodger clubhouse was so quiet you could hear a winning streak snap Monday. But amid the silence there was one conversation that spoke volumes.
After a 4-3 walk-off loss to the last-place Colorado Rockies — a loss set up by two poor plays from right fielder Teoscar Hernández — Mookie Betts met with manager Dave Roberts and Andrew Friedman, the Dodgers’ president of baseball operations, in Roberts’ office.
Betts, the Dodgers shortstop, is a six-time Gold Glove winner in right field. Hernández is not. On Monday, Hernández threw to the wrong base in the third inning, allowing the Rockies to score their second run, and in the ninth he was unable to hold Ezequiel Tovar’s bloop double. Two pitches later, Warming Bernabel bounced a single up to middle, scoring Tovar to end the game.
The Betts conversation afterward was private. But the circumstances that led to it were not. Clearly the bullpen is not the Dodgers’ only problem.
“He’s got to get better out there. There’s just no way to put it,” Roberts said of Hernández. “It’s not a lack of effort. But, you know, we’ve just got to kind of get better. We do.”
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ANGELS
Gavin Lux hit an early two-run homer and the Cincinnati Reds used three leadoff triples to beat the Angels 4-1 on Monday night.
TJ Friedl had a leadoff single in the first inning off Victor Mederos, making his second career start, and Lux followed with his fifth homer for a 2-0 lead.
Elly De La Cruz led off the fifth with his fourth triple this season before scoring on a sacrifice fly by Austin Hays to make it 3-1. Hays tripled in the third but was stranded.
Scott Barlow replaced Luis Mey with two on and two outs in the eighth and struck out Jo Adell swinging to keep it 4-1. Barlow fanned three more in the ninth for his first save this season.
From Thuc Nhi Nguyen: The Great Depression threatened the 1932 Olympics. A pandemic raged during the 2021 Tokyo Games. Parisians planned a “poop protest” in the Seine before the 2024 Games.
From natural disasters, construction woes or unpopular opinion, every Olympics has faced threats in the planning process.
Yet nearly every time, the city, ready or not, still hosted the Games.
With less than three years before the L.A. Olympics, calls on social media for the city to withdraw or cancel have intensified. Wildfires devastated Pacific Palisades and Altadena in January. L.A. had to balance a $1-billion deficit. Immigration raids have put communities on edge while President Trump has threatened further military intervention.
But Olympic preparations press forward. So invested in the success of the 2028 Games, the International Olympic Committee allowed venue naming rights for the first time in history. LA28, the private group responsible for organizing the Games, has contracted more than 70% of its $2.5-billion sponsorship goal, with more deals coming.
Stafford, sidelined since the start of training camp because of a back issue, practiced Monday for the first time.
That qualified as an unexpected and momentous development for the Rams as they prepare for their Sept. 7 opener against the Houston Texans at SoFi Stadium.
Stafford, 37, went through individual and team drills with the first-team offense. The 17th-year pro was a full participant, but he did not speak to reporters afterward.
From Ryan Kartje: When they chose to continue their college careers, both USC offensive lineman DJ Wingfield and UCLA wide receiver Kaedin Robinson thought the courts and NCAA had cleared the way for them to play a fifth season of football.
USC had told Wingfield as much, offering him $210,000 in NIL to join the Trojans’ offensive line. UCLA, meanwhile, offered Robinson $450,000 to be one of the Bruins’ top wideouts.
But after first seeing their waivers rejected in the spring, then suing the NCAA this summer, a U.S. District Court judge has now shut the door on either Wingfield or Robinson suiting up this fall.
1909 — The first race is held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Twelve-thousand spectators watch Austrian engineer Louis Schwitzer win a five-mile race with an average speed of 57.4 miles per hour. The track’s surface of crushed rock and tar breaks up in a number of places and causes the deaths of two drivers, two mechanics and two spectators.
1934 — Helen Hull Jacobs wins the women’s title in the U.S. Lawn Tennis Association championships.
1981 — Renaldo Nehemiah sets the world record in the 110 hurdles with a time of 12.93 seconds in a meet at Zurich, Switzerland.
1984 — Lee Trevino beats Gary Player and Lanny Wadkins by four strokes to take the PGA championship at Shoal Creek, Alabama.
1993 — Sergei Bubka wins his fourth consecutive pole vault title at the World Track and Field championships at Stuttgart, Germany.
1995 — Mike Tyson starts his comeback, knocking out Peter McNeeley in 89 seconds at Las Vegas. McNeeley’s manager Vinnie Vecchione jumps into the ring to stop the fight after his boxer is knocked down twice in the first round.
2001 — Michael Schumacher gets his fourth Formula One championship and matches Alain Prost’s series record of 51 victories by winning the Hungarian Grand Prix.
2004 — American swimmer Michael Phelps wraps up the 200/400m individual medley double at the Athens Olympics when he wins the 200m (1:57.14 OR) ahead of teammate Ryan Lochte.
2016 — Usain Bolt scores another sweep, winning three gold medals in his third consecutive Olympics. At the Rio de Janeiro Games, Bolt turns a close 4×100 relay race against Japan and the United States into a typical, Bolt-like runaway, helping Jamaica cross the line in 37.27 seconds. Allyson Felix wins an unprecedented fifth gold medal in women’s track and field, running the second leg of the 4×100-meter relay team.
2018 — Novak Đoković beats Roger Federer 6-4, 6-4 in the final of the Cincinnati Masters to become the first player to win all 9 Masters 1,000 tennis tournaments since the series started in 1990.
2018 — Jockey Drayden Van Dyke wins a record-tying seven races at Del Mar, including the $200,000 Del Mar Mile. He ties Hall of Famer Victor Espinoza for most wins in a single day in the seaside track’s history. Van Dyke’s only loss in eight mounts comes when he finishes second in the sixth race.
THIS DAY IN BASEBALL HISTORY
1909 — The Philadelphia Phillies were rained out for the 10th consecutive day, a major league record.
1913 — The Chicago Cubs tagged Grover Alexander for nine straight hits and six runs for a 10-4 triumph over the Philadelphia Phillies.
1921 — Detroit’s Ty Cobb got his 3,000th career hit at age 34, the youngest player to reach that plateau. The milestone hit was a single off Elmer Myers of the Boston Red Sox.
1934 — Moose Solters of the Boston Red Sox hit for the cycle in an 8-6 loss to the Detroit Tigers at Fenway Park.
1951 — Eddie Gaedel, a 65-pound midget who was 3-foot-7, made his first and only plate appearance as a pinch-hitter for Frank Saucier of the St. Louis Browns. Gaedel wearing No. 1/8 was walked on four pitches by Detroit Tigers pitcher Bob Cain and then was taken out for pinch-runner Jim Delsing. The gimmick by Browns owner Bill Veeck was completely legal, but later outlawed.
1957 — New York Giants owner Horace Stoneham announced that the team’s board of directors had voted 8-1 in favor of moving to San Francisco. The Giants would start the 1958 season in Seals Stadium.
1965 — Jim Maloney of the Cincinnati Reds no-hit the Cubs 1-0, in 10 innings in the first game of a doubleheader at Chicago. Leo Cardenas homered in the 10th for the Reds.
1969 — Ken Holtzman of the Cubs blanked the Atlanta Braves with a 3-0 no-hitter at Wrigley Field. Ron Santo’s three-run homer in the first inning provided the Cubs’ offense.
1990 — Bobby Thigpen recorded his 40th save as the Chicago White Sox beat the Texas Rangers 4-2. Thigpen became the eighth — and fastest — to accomplish this feat.
1992 — Bret Boone made history when he became part of the first three-generation family to play in major league baseball. Boone is the grandson of Ray Boone, who played from 1948-60, and son of Bob Boone, from 1972-90. Bret, 23, completed the triangle when he started at second base for the Seattle Mariners against Baltimore.
2007 — Johan Santana finished with a franchise-record 17 strikeouts in eight innings to help Minnesota edge Texas 1-0.
2009 — Florida reached 10 hits for the 15th straight game in a 6-3 loss at Houston, matching the longest streak since the St. Louis Browns had one that long in 1937. The Marlins were held to four hits the next game.
2011 — LaGrange, Ky., starter Griffin McLarty struck out 12 and hit a homer in a 1-0 victory over the hometown favorites from Clinton County in the Little League World Series at South Williamsport, Pa. The game drew 41,848 fans, breaking the record of 40,000 set in the 1989 and 1990 championship games.
2016 — Jose Altuve homered and had five RBIs, and the Houston Astros beat the Baltimore Orioles 15-8 despite allowing four home runs in the first inning. The Orioles became the first team in the modern era (since 1900) to open a game with four home runs before making an out. Adam Jones hit Collin McHugh’s first pitch into the seats in left field and Hyun Soo Kim singled before Manny Machado, Chris Davis and Mark Trumbo homered in succession.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
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DENVER — The rain came out of nowhere. So too, it seemed, did Max Muncy’s infield pop-up.
In the top of the sixth inning at Coors Field on Tuesday night, Muncy was at the plate with two out and two runners aboard when a sudden rainstorm opened up from overcast skies. Within moments, sheets of rain were pouring down. But as fans scattered for cover, umpires let the at-bat roll on.
“My glasses were pretty full of water at that point,” Muncy said. “Was just kind of praying to put the ball in play.”
In a full count, Muncy did, launching a sky-high pop-up down the first base line.
In clear conditions, it would have been a routine catch to end the inning.
But this time, neither Rockies first baseman Michael Toglia nor second baseman Thairo Estrada could locate the blur of leather as it came hurtling back to earth.
“When rain is falling that thick,” Muncy said, “it’s really hard to look up and find a baseball.”
Indeed, as Muncy pulled into first base, and teammates Shohei Ohtani and Dalton Rushing came trotting across the plate, Toglia looked toward Estrada, who initially appeared to be calling for the ball. But then, Estrada looked back at Toglia in confusion, neither appearing certain exactly where the pop-up went. At the last second, both instead ducked for cover, turtling with their arms around their heads. The ball landed between them, seemingly startling Toglia after dropping a few feet to his right.
In the scorebook, the play went down as a two-run single, representing the first runs in a game the Dodgers went on to win 8-1 — with the help of a victory-sealing grand slam from Muncy in the top of the seventh.
But in reality, it was another example of the Rockies’ helplessness in this historically hapless season — and a comical stroke of luck the Dodgers were more than happy to take.
“At first, I was just happy I made contact,” Muncy said. “Then you’re upset you pop it up. Then you see them kind of scrambling around and you start getting a little excited. Then it drops and obviously you’re happy about it.”
Entering this week’s trip to Colorado, manager Dave Roberts emphasized the importance of stacking wins against a Rockies team on pace to set an MLB record for losses in a season. He noted how it was part of a softer overall stretch in the team’s schedule, with the Dodgers (50-31) in a run of 12 straight games against teams with losing records.
“You need to beat the teams you’re supposed to beat,” Roberts said. “That’s just the way it is.”
In both games in Denver this week, the Rockies (18-62) have aided in that cause. On Monday, Toglia misplayed three balls in a six-run fourth-inning rally for the Dodgers that catapulted them to a series-opening win.
Tuesday’s blunder, however, was even more of an egregious eyesore; even if Roberts and Muncy both described it as a tricky play.
“I give Max a lot of credit for just staying in the at-bat, fighting to put the ball in play, to allow for something like that to happen,” Roberts said. “It certainly changed the momentum … With no runs [right there], it might have been a different ballgame.”
The next time Muncy came to the plate, he added to his RBI total in a more traditional way.
With the bases loaded and two out in the seventh, the scorching hot slugger turned on a hanging 0-and-2 slider and launched his second grand slam in the last three games way out to right field.
It gave Muncy six RBIs on the night, and a staggering 42 runs driven in over his last 37 games.
“Not everyone is swinging the bat well,” Roberts said, a group that most notably includes Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman, who went a combined 0-for-nine. “So to have that production from Max in the middle of the lineup has been paramount.”
“He’s got a lot of confidence right now,” Roberts added.
The offensive output — which continued with a towering home run from Michael Conforto in the eighth — marked one of the few times this year the Dodgers provided Yoshinobu Yamamoto with ample run support. On Wednesday alone, they matched the eight total runs they had scored in his previous four starts this month.
It proved to be plenty on a night the right-hander spun a much-needed gem, bouncing back from the 5.23 ERA he had in June entering the night with five scoreless innings that included one hit, one walk and six strikeouts.
Even at mile-high altitude, his ability to locate curveballs and splitters was particularly sharp, helping him rack up 39 strikes out of 56 pitches.
“I started feeling good last week, and going into today’s game,” Yamamoto said. “And then today I was attacking with first-pitch strikes pretty good. I think that was [the biggest difference].”
The only thing that stopped Yamamoto was the rain, forcing him to make an early exit after a one-hour, 27-minute delay that began immediately after Muncy’s pop-up. But by that point, the sudden showers had already done enough, helping the Dodgers take a lead they wouldn’t relinquish on a routine pop-up the Rockies’ infield lost sight of.
Said Muncy, with a laugh: “Hit it to the right spot, I guess.”
DENVER — When Major League Baseball’s trade deadline arrives next month, the Dodgers will almost certainly be on the lookout for help in the bullpen.
If their injury-plagued rotation takes any more hits, they might reluctantly have to explore the starting pitching market, as well.
But, when discussing the team’s deadline plans recently with The Times’ Bill Shaikin, the one potential area of offensive need that president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman seemed unlikely to address was left field.
Michael Conforto might be struggling mightily this season after signing for $17 million this winter. But the Dodgers have remained bullish on his ability to eventually help.
“Never say never,” Friedman said when asked about the possibility of trading for a left fielder in the next month, “but I think we would hold a very high bar and find it very unlikely.”
On Tuesday night at Coors Field, Conforto gave such optimism some badly needed life.
In the Dodgers’ 9-7 win against the woeful Colorado Rockies, the veteran slugger went two-for-five with an early double and a go-ahead home run, keying the team’s six-run rally in the fourth with a three-run blast launched deep to right.
The performance marked Conforto’s first multi-hit effort since May 27, and his first with multiple extra-base hits since collecting three doubles on May 13.
It was his first game all season with more than one RBI.
The question now is whether Tuesday was a temporary blip, or a legitimate turning point for Conforto?
The answer could have important implications on the Dodgers’ roster construction for the second half of the season.
Conforto’s overall numbers are still not easy on the eyes. His .171 batting average is easily the worst among qualified big-league hitters. His negative-0.7 mark in wins above replacement (an all-encompassing stat not helped by his limited defensive range in left field) entering the day ranked 158th out of 161 such players.
His playing time has also begun to decrease recently, with Conforto twice getting benched against right-handed pitchers last week in favor of fellow lefty hitter Hyeseong Kim in the outfield.
“I see [Conforto] playing a lot still,” manager Dave Roberts said then. “But I do think that in a meritocracy, in that vein, Hyeseong has earned opportunities.”
And yet, to this point, the Dodgers have sounded wary of shopping for a potential replacement ahead of the deadline.
“To date, obviously, Michael hasn’t performed up to what he expected or we expected,” Friedman said. “But, watching the way he is working, watching the progress being made, I would bet that his next two months are way better than his last two months.”
On Tuesday, the 32-year-old provided a blueprint for how.
One of Conforto’s primary weaknesses this season has been hitting the fastball. Entering Tuesday, he was batting just .174 against heaters, compared to a .283 average against them last year with the San Francisco Giants.
“That’s probably the genesis of the whole deal,” Roberts said of Conforto’s struggles. “When you don’t hit the fastball, that starts to lend to a little cheating, chasing on spin. And so we got to get him back on the heater.”
In his first at-bat against right-handed Rockies starter Germán Márquez, Conforto finally did, turning on an inside four-seamer for a double down the right-field line; just his second extra-base hit of June.
Power has been another missing piece of Conforto’s game. A four-time 20-home run hitter in his 10-year career, he entered Tuesday with only four long balls this season; all of them solo shots.
But in the fourth inning, he came up with two aboard –– after two misplays by Rockies first baseman Michael Toglia led to a pair of Dodgers runs that erased an early 2-0 deficit. Then, when Márquez flipped a 1-and-1 curveball low in the zone, Conforto found the barrel for his three-run blast, putting the Dodgers (49-31) in front 5-2.
Left-hander Justin Wrobleski made the lead stand up, yielding just two runs over five innings of bulk relief to lower his ERA to 3.54 in four outings this month. Shohei Ohtani added some insurance in the sixth with his National League-leading 27th home run, muscling a two-run drive the other way. And though the Rockies (18-61) scored four unanswered runs in the seventh and eighth innings to make it close late, Tanner shut the door with a four-out save to seal the team’s 11th win in its last 15 games.
Conforto didn’t have another hit, grounding out with two aboard in the fifth, flying out with a runner at second in the seventh and grounding out again with a runner at second in the ninth.
His season-long woes are far from being rectified. His long-term role with the team, even in a best-case scenario, might be as more of a part-time player (especially if Kim continues to command more playing time).
But, if the Dodgers are truly hoping to avoid having to replace Conforto at the deadline, Tuesday at least represented a potential start.
DENVER — The Colorado Rockies have fired Bud Black, the winningest manager in franchise history, after a 7-33 start that’s one of the worst in Major League Baseball history.
Colorado promoted third base coach Warren Schaeffer to be the interim manager, the team announced Sunday after a 9-3 win over San Diego. That victory wasn’t enough to save Black’s job after the Rockies lost 21-0 to the Padres on Saturday night. They also fired bench coach Mike Redmond. Hitting coach Clint Hurdle takes over as interim bench coach.
The Rockies have the worst 40-game start since the 1988 Baltimore Orioles, who were 6-34.
“Our play so far this season, especially coming off the last two seasons, has been unacceptable. Our fans deserve better, and we are capable of better,” said Rockies owner, chairman and CEO Dick Monfort in a statement. “While we all share responsibility in how this season has played out, these changes are necessary. We will use the remainder of 2025 to improve where we can on the field and to evaluate all areas of our operation so we can properly turn the page into the next chapter of Rockies Baseball.”
Colorado was 19 1/2 games out of first place in the NL West before Sunday’s win. The Rockies have been outscored by 128 runs so far this season. The only team since 1900 with a worse run differential through 40 games was the 2023 Oakland Athletics (-144).
The seventh manager in team history, Black initially found success with Colorado when he led the Rockies to back-to-back playoff appearances in 2017 and ’18. They haven’t finished with a winning record since and are coming off two straight 100-loss seasons. Colorado has a .353 winning percentage since 2023.
Black’s contract was set to expire following the season. He signed a one-year extension in October.
Black was 544-689 in nine seasons while wearing the purple pinstripes. He surpassed Hurdle last season for the team record in both games managed and wins.
The easygoing demeanor of Black seemed to be a good fit for a Rockies team relying heavily on youth. The lineup features a nucleus of Gold Glove winners Ezequiel Tovar and Brenton Doyle, along with the recent call-up of highly touted outfielder Zac Veen, who has since been sent back down. On the mound, they’ve promoted prized pitcher Chase Dollander, the ninth overall draft pick in 2023.
But little has gone right for Black and the Rockies. They allowed 10 or more runs in four straight games, culminating in the football-like 21-0 score Saturday.
A team owned by Monfort and run by general manager Bill Schmidt didn’t make any splash moves to bolster a spiraling club. Their payroll this season is listed at $125.7 million and is 20th in the league, according to Spotrac, a site that tracks payroll.
One reason for the Rockies’ free fall has been the health of slugger Kris Bryant, who’s struggled to stay on the field after signing a $182 million, seven-year contract ahead of the 2022 season. He’s currently on the injured list with lumbar degenerative disk disease.
Before taking over the Rockies, Black spent time in charge of San Diego. He was 649-713 in nine seasons with the Padres and was named the NL manager of the year in 2010.
In addition to his managerial stints in San Diego and Colorado, Black spent seven seasons as the pitching coach for the Angels, who made it to postseason three times and were World Series champions in 2002.
Before breaking into the managerial ranks, Black spent parts of 15 seasons on the mound after the left-hander was picked by Seattle in the 17th round of the 1979 draft. He spent time with the Mariners (1981), Kansas City (1982-88), Cleveland (1988-90, 1995), Toronto (1990) and San Francisco (1991-94). He finished 121-116 with a 3.84 ERA over 398 games.
Black was with the Royals when they won the 1985 World Series, making one start and a relief appearance against St. Louis.
