During the Dodgers’ season-long five-game losing streak this week, manager Dave Roberts cited a lack of “fight” from his lineup as the most troubling trend in the team’s recent skid.
On Wednesday in Milwaukee, more fight finally returned — only for the Brewers to still land the knockout punch.
In a 3-2 loss at American Family Field that extended the Dodgers’ losing streak to six games, the lineup once again scuffled in a five-hit performance while closer Tanner Scott blew a ninth-inning lead to waste Tyler Glasnow’s encouraging return from the injured list.
It was a grind of a game, with the Dodgers scoring their only runs on a bases-loaded walk following a hit-and-run play and a sacrifice fly that briefly gave them a 2-1 lead. After Scott gave up a game-tying RBI single to Andrew Vaughn in the ninth, Jackson Chourio walked it off against Kirby Yates in the bottom of the 10th, sending the scuffling Dodgers their longest losing skid since April 2019.
While a shorthanded offense remained mired in its recent slump, Glasnow’s return at least provided the afternoon with a positive sign. Making his first start since going on the injured list in April because of a shoulder injury, and just his 28th start in two years with the Dodgers since signing a $136.5-million contract two winters ago, the lanky right-hander pitched decently over his five innings, giving up two hits and three walks with five strikeouts.
Glasnow ran into trouble in the second inning, when Christian Yelich singled on a first-pitch fastball, Isaac Collins drew a full-count walk, and both executed a double-steal to move into scoring position. A 10-pitch walk to Caleb Durbin — ending on a curveball that never ducked into the strike zone — loaded the bases with one out.
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However, Glasnow responded, jamming Jake Bauers with a sinker for a pop out before blowing Joey Ortiz away with an elevated 96 mph heater.
That sequence was Glasnow at his best: Going after hitters with his premium velocity, and showing no signs of the tentativeness — or, as Roberts described it in his pregame address, “search mode” — that has often derailed his Dodgers career.
“There’s always fine-tuning, but when you’re out there competing, it’s hard to be in search mode,” Roberts said pregame. “I know he’s healthy. The pitching guys feel good with where his delivery is at. So now it’s just go out there and keep that rhythm and execute pitches and compete.”
As Glasnow settled into a rhythm, however, the Dodgers continued to toil at the plate.
Having scored only one run in four of their previous five games, a shorthanded lineup, which got Tommy Edman back from injury but once again was without Teoscar Hernández in the starting lineup, struggled to get a beat on crafty veteran left-hander José Quintana.
With only a 90-mph fastball and a flurry of funky off-speed pitches, the 36-year-old navigated the first four innings without giving up a hit.
A breakthrough finally came in the fifth inning. After Miguel Rojas drew a leadoff walk, the Dodgers executed a well-timed hit-and-run play, drawing the second baseman out of position just as Esteury Ruiz lined a single through the hole he vacated. With two outs, James Outman then checked his swing just enough to draw a full-count walk, loading the bases for Shohei Ohtani to plate the game’s first run on a four-pitch free pass (benefitting from a couple borderline ball calls).
And while that 1-0 lead didn’t last long — in the bottom of the fifth, Glasnow walked leadoff man Bauers, moved him to second with a balk, then watched helplessly as Bauers stole third and scored on a throw that bounced to the outfield — the Dodgers went back in front in the seventh when Mookie Betts lifted a bases-loaded sacrifice fly.
The Dodgers, though, squandered opportunities to stretch the lead from, leaving the bases loaded to end the seventh inning before stranding more baserunners in both the eighth and ninth.
That left Scott with too little margin to complete a four-out save. While the left-hander stranded a runner at second base he inherited in the eighth, three ninth-inning singles from the Brewers tied the score, culminating with a broken-bat, bloop single from Vaughn that made it 2-2.
Then, after Brewers closer Trevor Megill struck out the side in the top of the 10th, Yates surrendered the game-winning single to Churio in the bottom half of the inning, handing the Dodgers their second-straight series sweep.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
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