Dodgers Fall to Angels in Game Two of Freeway Exhibition

Game two of the Dodgers and Angels exhibition Freeway Series was last night. It was the first game played at Dodger Stadium since the devastating Game 7 World Series loss. Rich Hill was on the mound for Los Angeles facing off against Matt Shoemaker. Hill went an inning longer than his opponent, but yielded much different results.

Rich Hill’s final tuneup is done. 5 IP, 8 H, 4 R (3 ER), 0 BB, 4 Ks. 79/56.

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— AlaNNa Rizzo (@alannarizzo) March 27, 2018

Hill cruised through his first two innings of work, allowing a single to Mike Trout and a single to Kole Calhoun. The wheels came off in the third inning though. Hill allowed five straight batters to reach base en route to a 4 run inning for the Angels. It would end up being the only runs they scored all night.

Hill also did not get much help from his defense in the inning. Austin Barnes allowed Mike Trout to reach on catcher’s interference lunging for a late breaking ball. Trout clipped his glove on his swing and Barnes got checked on by a trainer, but stayed in the game.

On the offensive sides of things, the Dodgers did not have much to show all game long. Matt Shoemaker allowed just 2 hits in his four innings of work, and on one of those hits, Cody Bellinger got thrown out at third trying to stretch his double out. The remainder of their 5 total hits were sprinkled out sparsely over the next 5 innings.

The only real action of the game for the Dodgers came in the ninth inning. That was when Andrew Toles hammered a deep home run to right field:

For Toles, that was his third home run and his 10th RBI in what has been a very promising Spring Training. He is now hitting .288 over 52 at bats in his return from knee surgery last season. Toles is thought to be competing  for a starting job alongside Matt Kemp, and probably will all season.

Pedro Baez, Ross Stripling, and Tony Cingrani all tossed a scoreless inning of work to backup Rich Hill. Kenley Jansen came on in the ninth to face two batters and struck them both out, and Scott Alexander finished up the game without any trouble.

Looking Ahead

Before they officially start their season on Thursday night against San Francisco, the Dodgers will face off one more time against the Angels tonight. Hyun-Jin Ryu will face of against JC Ramirez for his final spring tuneup game of spring. Ryu’s spring thus far has been less than encouraging, as he have given up 10 earned runs in just 10.2 innings of work. The encouraging news thus far is that his velocity does seem to have returned even if the results have not shown immediately. Ryu is expected to anchor the starting rotation for the first part of the year.