Clayton Kershaw Sees Red And Locks In, Yasiel Puig Delivers Late
Mark Reynolds grounded to Callaspo, who threw low to Justin Turner at first base, but the utility man made a nice pick for the first out. After Yadier Molina drew a one-out walk, Kozma flied to center and Garcia grounded out. Hernandez reached on a leadoff single in the bottom of the fifth, only to be erased on a double play hit into by Rollins in what finished as another scoreless inning.
The sixth was one that required Kershaw to field his position. He struck out Bourjos on three pitches, then was forced to cover first base as Turner made a nice stop up the first base line on a ball hit by Wong. Kershaw fielded the toss and just beat the Cardinals’ second baseman to the bag for the second out. Holliday hit a tapper in front of the mound that Kershaw scooped up and threw to first to end the inning.
Kozma was kept busy in the bottom of the sixth as he took care of back-to-back grounders from A.J. Ellis and Kershaw for two quick outs. Garcia then picked up his sixth strikeout of the game by painting the outside corner against Pederson. Kershaw sailed through the seventh, picking up his ninth and 10th strikeouts of the game with the latter giving him 100 on the season.
Despite Kozma guarding the third base line, Heisey was able to rip a leadoff double by him in the bottom of the seventh to give the Dodgers their first true threat of the game. Puig ended his string of strikeouts by hitting an RBI double to the right-center field gap to give the Dodgers a 1-0 lead.
Turner followed with a hard-hit ball up the middle that Wong got his glove on, but it rolled into shallow center field, allowing Puig to score and extending the Dodgers lead to 2-0. Kershaw got a pair of fly ball outs in the eighth and ended the inning by hitting the outside corner against pinch-hitter Tony Cruz for his 11th strikeout of the game on 106 pitches.
Seth Maness came on in the bottom of the eighth and gave up a leadoff single to Callaspo. After Ellis bunted him into scoring position, Adrian Gonzalez pinch-hit for Kershaw. The Dodger first baseman flied out on the first pitch he saw and the Dodgers failed to pad their lead.
Kenley Jansen entered in the ninth for his first action since missing a game in Colorado due to high blood pressure. Jansen retired the side in order to convert his sixth save in as many tries.
[divide]Would Don Mattingly Use A Pitcher To Pinch-Hit Or Pinch-Run?
