ST. LOUIS — The best-hitting team in baseball with runners in scoring position, the Dodgers suddenly can’t buy a timely hit.
They were shut out into the ninth inning Saturday afternoon, losing 2-1 to the St. Louis Cardinals on Nolan Arenado’s pinch-hit walkoff single in the bottom of the ninth.
The first run of the day didn’t even score until the bottom of the eighth, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Erick Fedde putting up scoreless starts. The Cardinals put two runners on with two out against Dodgers reliever Ben Casparius. Alec Burleson bounced a ball back up the middle that ricocheted off Casparius and toward shortstop.
Casparius scrambled to retrieve the ball and made an ill-advised attempt to throw Burleson out at first. His throw was wide. Masyn Winn started the play on second base, went to third on the grounder and raced home when Casparius’ throw pulled Freddie Freeman away from first base. Freeman’s throw home was too late to get Winn.
It took that kind of extraordinary effort to score a run on this day.
The Dodgers stranded 12 runners on base, going 0 for 12 with runners in scoring position. The Dodgers lead the majors in hitting with runners in scoring position (.308 to start the day) but have gone 1 for 25 in the two losses in St. Louis.
When they finally did score to tie the game in the top of ninth, it came on a wild pitch, Shohei Ohtani scoring from third base as Freeman struck out.
The Dodgers scored 18 runs to beat the New York Yankees on Saturday. They took the next week to match that total, scoring 18 in the seven games since.
It is familiar territory for Yamamoto. The Dodgers have not treated the best starter in their depleted rotation very well. He has been on the wrong side of two of the Dodgers’ four shutouts this season and they have scored just 3.7 runs per game in Yamamoto’s 13 starts.
Yamamoto had hit his own rough patch recently with a 4.55 ERA over his previous five starts. But he put up his own zeroes against the Cardinals.
He was not at his best early. He allowed a hit and walked a batter in the first inning, escaping damage when Winn was picked off third base. In the second, the Cardinals loaded the bases on two hits and a hit batter but Yamamoto struck out Lars Nootbaar to put up another zero.
That was the first of seven consecutive batters retired by Yamamoto, four on strikeouts.
He dodged more damage again in the fifth inning, stranding two more runners.
Yamamoto’s splitter was his best friend. He got eight of his 14 swings-and-misses with the pitch including the finishing pitch on five of his nine strikeouts.
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