Late clutch hitting enough to down the Fish

The Dodgers and Marlins were locked in a scoreless battle through five innings in Friday night's game. Hiroki Kuroda and Chris Volstad were tossing blanks, and the opportunities the hitters had were never capitalized on.

Then the seventh inning came, and the Dodgers finally found some ways to break it open. The result was a 7-3 win to even their record at 2-2.

Both teams had men on third with less than two outs in the first, but came up empty. The Marlins were first on the board in the sixth thanks to an RBI single from Jorge Cantu to score Cameron "Tiki" Mayben (sorry, inside joke to those who live in Binghamton like me). Mayben reached on a bunt single, then went to second on Russell Martin's throwing error.

Manny Ramirez got the fun started in the seventh with a leadoff double to center. Matt Kemp got him over to third on a sac-fly. From there, Volstad was chased after an RBI double by Casey Blake, and a run scoring single from Blake DeWitt, making it 2-1. An error by Hanley Ramirez off the bat of Reed Johnson scored both Jamey Carroll and Martin, and it was 4-1.

A few more runs were tacked on in the ninth, thanks to some big hits and shaky bullpen work from the Marlins. Martin walked and Rafael Furcal doubled, part of his 3-for-4 night. A scorching double by James Loney scored them both, increasing the lead to 7-1.

About the only negative from the night was the work of Russ Ortiz, who was atrocious. His only job in the ninth was to get the game over with, but he then gave up a single and walked two. Jonathan Broxton gave up an two-run double, but struck out the final two to end it.

While the late hitting was nice, the real story of this night was Kuroda. He looked really, really good. He was throwing hard all night, with plenty of late movement. The final tally was eight innings, five hits, one run (unearned), one walk, and seven strikeouts. The other starters could learn something from him: you throw strikes and cut down the walks, you can have success. And that he did.

I'm glad to see the regulars pick up the pace late in the game, because they've struggled to start the year. Yesterday it was the bench players like Ronnie Belliard and Johnson that carried the load. It all started with Manny's double in the seventh, and the rest took off from there.

Saturday night's pitching matchup features a couple of Opening Day starters who struggled. Vicente Padilla was rocked by the Pirates, and Josh Johnson never got going against the Mets. They'll both look to rebound and get his team over the .500 mark.