Casey Schmitt’s third-inning grand slam led the San Francisco Giants to a 6-2 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers Friday night, resulting in a tie for first place in the National League West.
The Giants jumped out to an early lead with Willy Adames’ solo home run in the top of the first, crushing a fastball left up in the middle of the strike zone by Dodgers starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto. Los Angeles tied the score at 1-1 in the second after Logan Webb walked Will Smith and Teoscar Hernández to begin the inning. Smith moved to third on a Max Muncy groundout and scored on a sacrifice fly by Andy Pages.
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However, Yamamoto gave up the lead for good in the third by walking Jung Hoo Lee, Heliot Ramos and Wilmer Flores to load the bases. In between those walks, he struck out Willy Adames and Dominic Smith to provide a chance to escape the inning with no damage. But Schmitt got hold of a splitter low and inside and knew he hit the pitch out of the park.
The Dodgers added a run in the seventh on Hernández’s 12th home run of the year, but the Giants got that run back with an Andrew Knizner homer to restore the four-run lead. Tyler Rogers and Ryan Walker each pitched a scoreless, hitless inning to close out the win.
Los Angeles has lost two of its past three games and seven of 12, allowing San Francisco to catch them for first place in the division at 41-29. The San Diego Padres (38-30) are two games behind both teams after a 5-1 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks (35-34) on Friday. San Diego has lost three of four games and six of 10.
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Yamamoto was roughed up for the second time in his past two starts, allowing five runs on six hits and five walks over 4 2/3 innings. He threw only 56 of his 102 pitches for strikes. Justin Wrobleski pitched the remaining 4 1/3 innings to save the Dodgers’ bullpen, giving up only Knizner’s home run while notching five strikeouts.
“I was having a little struggle to hit my spots where I wanted to locate my pitches,” Yamamoto said afterwards through an interpreter (via the Orange County Register). “That led me to fall behind. And then gave up the three walks. And then after that the grand slam.”
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said that he thought Yamamoto’s stuff was good, but he tried to be “too fine” with his pitches, affecting his command.
Clayton Kershaw (1-0, 4.35 ERA) starts for the Dodgers on Saturday, while Landen Roupp (4-4, 3.29) goes for the Giants.
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