The Dodgers blew a 7-1 lead on Sunday night against the visiting San Diego Padres, in what is being billed as the next best rivalry in baseball, in sports some might say, and lost in extra innings, 8-7. It was a bigger surprise than Anthony Hopkins winning the Oscar for best actor.
The Academy put Chadwick Boseman on second base before the Oscars started and Hopkins scored the award for best actor. Talk about a ghost runner. No one saw that coming.
The Dodgers took a six-run lead after scoring five runs in the sixth inning against the Padres on Sunday night, then fell apart.
The Padres scored six runs in the next three innings to tie the score and won the game in the 11th inning on a sacrifice fly that scored Fernando Tatis Jr.
More on Tatis in a moment.
The Dodgers bullpen collapsed.
The Dodger kids collapsed.
The Dodger fans collapsed, from exhaustion -- the game lasted five hours -- from embarrassment -- the Dodgers never lose this way to the Padres -- and from entitlement -- who do the Padres think they are anyway?
The only thing that didn’t collapse was the Dodgers lead in the National League West standings. Even after going 2-4 last week, the Dodgers are still in first place, a game ahead of the San Francisco Giants, and still have the best record in baseball at 15-7.
None of that makes losing to the Padres after blowing a six-run lead any easier.
Who’s to blame?
The bullpen takes a big share of this. David Price was not sharp again. He opened the floodgates, giving the Padres hope in the seventh inning.
Brusdar Graterol did the real damage, giving up two runs in a third of an inning.
Jimmy Nelson delivered the fatal blow, allowing two runs on four hits in the ninth inning, enough for the Padres to tie the score and send the game into extra innings.
Garrett Cleavinger, making his first appearance of the season, ended up taking the loss, allowing the winning run to score in the 11th inning.
The bullpen was brutal.
Playing without Cody Bellinger is worse.
Gavin Lux has missed some games too because of injuries. Sheldon Neuse, Luke Raley, DJ Peters and Edwin Rios have been filling in for Bellinger and Lux lately. And while they have shown flashes of talent, they are clearly not ready for the big leagues yet.
The Dodgers finish their worst week of the season splitting two with the Seattle Mariners and losing three of four to the Padres.
Tatis made this presence felt in this series. He hit five home runs. He has six home runs in seven games against the Dodgers this season. He also has more errors, nine, than home runs, seven.
Corey Seager deserves some of the blame for the Dodgers woes of the past week. He is 6-for-28 in his past seven games, a .214 batting average over that stretch. Ugh!
Here are the Dodgers starting pitcher power rankings:
- Julio Urias
- Trevor Bauer
- Clayton Kershaw
- Dustin May
- Walker Buehler
The Dodgers start a three-game series against the last-place Cincinnati Reds today, then head to Milwaukee for a four-game weekend series against the first-place Brewers.
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