Five most valuable players took the field at Angel Stadium on Friday night. Two of them, Cody Bellinger and Clayton Kershaw, led the Dodgers to a 7-4 victory over the Angels.
Kershaw shone, throwing seven innings of one ball, with one hit, to lead the Dodgers to their National League-leading 14th win.
But Bellinger stole the show. He scored two homers, marking the 12th multi-homer game of his career and the first of the season.
The results came as relief. Bellinger has started the season in a deep funk. He entered the game batting .165 on Friday with two home runs and a .489 to-base-plus-slipping percentage. He was encouraged the past few days by how much harder he hit the ball, but his figures were a hot point of the average .305 and 1,035 OPS he placed last year en route to an MVP award.
“I was just more frustrated,” Bellinger said. ‘I could not tell you the size of the monkey [on my back]. I would say monkey with decent size. But I felt good about it. I just trust the process and stick to it. ‘
Asked if Bellinger might want to try to fill the MVP tag, manager Dave Roberts announced the point earlier this week.
“There may be something to it,” he said. ‘Whether the player accepts it or not, when you follow an MVP campaign, you certainly set yourself expectations. But our posts are just going out, participating, good bats and taking our baseball games to win. ”
Dodgers vs. Angels play highlights.
To ease the pressure, the Dodgers dropped Bellinger to fifth in the handball rankings for the first time this season.
Bellinger was undefeated in the first two at-bats Friday, but the decision ultimately proved fruitful.
‘He looked like he was looking early, and when we hung the slider,’ said Angels manager Joe Maddon, referring to the field that Bellinger hit 379 feet in his third ball against Angels starter Patrick Sandoval, ‘he felt a much better next time up. … He looks the same [as he did in 2019]. He will be fine. ”
Bellinger’s blasts, in the sixth and eighth innings, served to stretch Dodgers’ lead. As for other MVPs Mike Trout and Albert Pujols? They remained in the background for the Angels. And Mookie Betts was mostly quiet for the Dodgers.
Fresh from a six-homer game the night before, the Dodgers took a 2-0 lead in the third inning that played small ball. Austin Barnes started with a single and Betts reached second base on a baseball bobbled by third baseman Anthony Rendon.
Corey Seager grounded in the choice of a field goal before Justin Turner shot an RBI single in right field. Seager scored from the third when Turner slid hard enough into second base to overtake the Angels’ Tommy La Stella, preventing him from turning a double shot on AJ Pollock’s chopper.
The Angels failed to make runs in the same way before a two-run rally in the eighth innings after Kershaw handcuffed them for the first seven.
Kershaw made his third start after the start of the season sidelined with a back injury. He threw 5 2/3 scoreless innings against the Arizona Diamondbacks in his debut. He stumbled in his second start, allowing him four runs on seven hits over 4 1/3 innings against the San Francisco Giants.
Friday looks like the first outing. His fastball averaged 92 mph – a strong indicator of success.
“I knew it was him,” said Kershaw, whose fastball averaged below 91 mph in 2018 and 2019. “I think that’s what’s been frustrating the last few years. It’s hard to figure out why it did not turn out the way I wanted it to. … I can not determine one specific thing, but all the things we tried “There were a lot of things that were fixed. It’s really gratifying.”
Clayton Kershaw threw seven innings of one ball, with one hit, in the Dodgers’ lead to their NL-best 14th win.
(Jae C. Hong / Associated Press)
Kershaw allowed a walk to start the second inning, but did not allow a hit until Rendon hung up a leadoff home team in the fifth. It was Rendon’s fifth homer of the season and fourth in four games.
The Angels, holding on to two walks and Rendon’s homer, had little else to do against Kershaw.
Kershaw’s performance dwarfed the six-inning effort of Sandoval, whose winning streak without career extended to 12 consecutive starts.
In addition to the third inning, Sandoval hiccuped mostly early, needing only 59 pitches to get through five innings. He threw first strike after 17 of the first 20 fighters he faced.
Then Turner took a walk to lead the sixth inning. Two fighters later, Sandoval throws his head back in frustration.
Bellinger had a high-slung grip and sent his first homer of the night screaming into the right corner. None of the previous 16 sliders that Sandoval offered the Dodgers were put in play. Of 11 swings made against it, seven came low.
But Bellinger saw someone he liked. He needed nothing else.
“It’s really easy to say don’t focus on the results,” Bellinger said. “If the results are not there, it’s frustrating. But I’ve been feeling really good lately and that’s positive. ”
Three observations about the Angels
– Patrick Sandoval gave up six hits and five runs, earning four of them, in six-plus innings. The performance ended in the sixth loss of his career. His 12 consecutive starts without a win to start his career is the longest stretch in Angels history.
– When the Angels closed the hole in the eighth inning and scored two runs on back-to-back singles from Tommy La Stella and David Fletcher, prospect Jo Adell showed some progress. He signed the first major league tour in the 26th record appearance of his young career.
– La Stella’s RBI hit in the eighth ended the scoreless streak of the Dodgers bullpen at 21 1/3 innings.
