Freddie Freeman reached 200 hits in a season for the first time in his career, but oddly like with other personal accomplishments achieved with the Los Angeles Dodgers, it came in a losing effort.
Freeman had two of the Dodgers’ five hits in their 5-1 loss to the San Francisco Giants, who maintain a glimmer of hope of being among the three National League Wild Card teams.
Caleb Ferguson successfully filled the opener role for a second consecutive time, and Gavin Stone initially followed him with scoreless work.
Stone ran into some trouble in the fourth inning when Joc Pederson’s slicing drive to left-center field had just enough carry to sail out of James Outman’s reach for a leadoff double. Stone nearly stranded the extra-base hit but gave up a two-out home run to Mike Yastrzemski that put the Giants up 2-0.
Thairo Estrada’s solo homer off Stone in the sixth inning extended the Giants lead, and it was followed by a walk that marked the end of the night for the right-hander.
Ryan Yarbrough finished out the game with 3.2 innings. He kept the Giants off the scoreboard until Tyler Fitzgerald hit a two-run homer in the ninth.
While Yarbrough’s outing nevertheless took a burden off the Dodgers bullpen, their offense was unable to overcome the deficit Stone left them in.
That was despite Sean Manaea entering the night a career 0-5 with a 9.00 ERA in nine games (six starts) against the Dodgers. He pitched a season-high seven innings and allowed just three hits.
Manaea cruised throughout the night, which included a remarkably efficient four-pitch six inning that entailed retiring Miguel Rojas, Mookie Betts and Freeman in order.
For as well as Manaea pitched, the Giants bullpen nearly cost them the game. A strikeout-passed ball kept the eighth inning alive and put two on. That also was the first time the Dodgers had a runner reach scoring position.
Betts then walked to load the bases and Freeman followed with an RBI single. Camilo Doval then took over for Tyler Rogers and converted a four-out save.
Freddie Freeman makes MLB history
Freeman is the first player in Dodgers franchise history with at least 200 hits, 25 home runs and 20 stolen bases in a single season. He also became the first first baseman in MLB history to reach 200 hits, 20 home runs and 20 steals in one year.
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