The Los Angeles Dodgers were headed toward a second consecutive loss to the Colorado Rockies but back-to-back home runs by Chris Taylor and Yasiel Puig in the eighth inning propelled them to a 5-3 victory.
The win was the Dodgers fifth in the past six games, and it moved them to 4.5 back of the first-place Rockies in the National League West standings.
Although the Dodgers scored first, their bullpen again proved to be a point of weakness. JT Chargois walked Trevor Story to start the sixth inning, and the Rockies shortstop promptly stole second base. He later scored the go-ahead run on Ian Desmond’s base hit.
It was Desmond’s second RBI on the night, as his two-out solo home run off Brock Stewart cut the Rockies’ deficit in half in the third inning. Stewart ran into more two-out trouble in the third as Nolan Arenado capped off string of three base hits to tie the game.
Stewart allowed two runs on five hits across four innings in what was his first start of the season. The Dodgers provided him with early run support in the first inning, behind Matt Kemp’s RBI single and Puig’s walk with the bases loaded.
Chad Bettis settled in from there, however, retiring 12 of the next 13 batters faced. Rockies reliever Bryan Shaw was responsible for the Dodgers taking the lead on their home runs.
It was a welcomed sight for Taylor, who’s been dropped in the batting order because of his recent struggles. Meanwhile, the homer was Puig’s fifth in his last eight games, with the hot streak beginning after he was held without a home run through 28 games (25 starts).
Tony Cingrani, Josh Fields and Kenley Jansen each collected a strikeout and tossed a scoreless inning of relief to seal the come-from-behind victory. Jansen was the only of the three to surrender a hit — a one-out ground-rule double to Chris Iannetta.
Iannetta’s extra-base hit made Taylor’s diving catch to rob Desmond of a hit to start the ninth inning all the more imperative.
