The Dodgers had it all going on in the first part of Thursday night's game in Colorado: good pitching from Clayton Kershaw, big hits from Matt Kemp, and a comfy four-run lead.
Then Kershaw hit a wall in the sixth, and the wheels fell off the bus.
For the second straight start, Kershaw started off a house of fire and then fell apart in the middle innings as the Rockies scored six unanswered runs to beat the Dodgers, 9-7. The Dodgers had leads of 4-0 and 7-3, yet their pitching once again let them down.
Chalk this one up to one of the most frustrating loses of the 2011 season.
First, the good. In the fourth, the Dodgers broke the scoreless game when Kemp led off with his 18th bomb of the season. That's good for first in the NL and two behind the mighty Jose Bautista for the league's lead. In fact, Kemp went 3-for-5 with three RBIs, and was a single away from the cycle. Not that any of it mattered in the end.
Kershaw got a rally going in the fifth when he singled with one out. Dee Gordon, getting another start in the leadoff spot, singled to left for two on. An out later, Andre Ethier hit an RBI single, and it was 2-0. Kemp then smacked a two-run triple to push the lead to 4-0.
Getting through the fifth was no problem at all for Kershaw, who by that point had given up only two hits. But then, for whatever reason, he looked just awful in the sixth. Carlos Gonzalez started it with a one-out single. Chris Nelson then grounded one hard off of Kershaw's glove to put two on.
Todd Helton worked a good at-bat by taking a walk to load the bases. The dangerous Troy Tulowitzki then hit a two-run double to slash the score to 4-2. Ty Wiggington plated another run with a groundout, and it was 4-3.
Despite looking lost, Don Mattingly kept Kershaw in to hit, and for the time being it actually paid off when he singled leading off. Gordon laid down a great bunt for a hit, and Kershaw came all the way around to score on a horrible throw by catcher Jose Morales. Casey Blake's double easily scored Gordon, and Ethier collected a sac-fly RBI to push the lead back up to four at 7-3.
And just when you thought the Dodgers were safe again, the Rockies went to town. Leaving Kershaw in was not the smart choice, as he immediately gave up two singles and a walk to load the bases. In came Scott Elbert, who gave up an RBI single to Gonzalez and bases loaded walk to Helton, making it 7-5.
Bringing in Mike MacDougal did diddly squat, as he was just as horrendous as the others. He surrendered a two-run single to Tulo, beaned Ty Wiggington, and walked Jason Giambi to force in another run to give the Rockies an 8-7 edge. Blake Hawksworth got the last two outs in order to at least keep in close.
The offense for the Dodgers disappeared from there, as only Ethier reached base the final two innings with a double. I can't say I'm too surprised that they couldn't rally. They were probably deflated from watching the pitching staff just hand this one away. It was pathetic.
What concerns me the most about this one is how Kershaw just melted down once again. It's easy to dismiss this as just a bad night, but that's twice in a row he went from dominant to batting practice in the flick of a switch. I'm not sure if he's feeling a dead arm in the middle of games or what, but the Dodgers can't afford to watch their ace implode like that.
The other concern, obviously, is the atrocious bullpen work. Elbert and MacDougal combined to face six batters and only get one out, with two hits, two walks, and a beaning going to the rest. The seventh inning alone saw two runs score on walks. That's just completely inexcusable. It would be inexcusable on the high school level, let alone the majors.
It seems like the second you start feeling good about the Dodgers playing solid baseball again, they do something like this to remind everyone that they are as mediocre as you can get. They have no killer instinct to bury teams like this. Instead, they mess around way too much and let other teams battle back. I probably don't need to tell you that that's not exactly the way playoff teams play.
The Dodgers have three more in Colorado, and maybe that's a good thing that they get more cracks at putting this one behind them. It starts with Chad Billingsley taking the mound, looking for his fourth straight win after starting the season 1-3. He'll go against Jhoulys Chacin, who's sporting a 6-4 record with a 3.19 ERA.
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