Clayton Kershaw is one of the best pitchers in the history of Petco Park, but he struggled to live up to that billing on Wednesday night as the Los Angeles Dodgers were swept by the San Diego Padres.
He entered the game 11-5 with a 2.08 ERA in 21 career starts at the Padres’ home ballpark.
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts hoped Kershaw would get through five innings but had a rough limit of 85 pitches. He wound up completing just 3.2 innings and allowed seven runs (three earned) in an 8-1 loss.
“Not very good. Just not a lot went well at all. Just got to pitch better,” Kershaw said after the game. “There was a lot of things I was missing.
“Just wasn’t executing, wasn’t throwing what I wanted to or where I wanted to. Frustrating overall, but just get back out on the next one.”
The Dodgers committed three errors — one from Kershaw and two by Gavin Lux.
Kershaw’s came on Bryce Johnson’s bunt with runners at the corners. Kershaw overran the ball as he attempted to field it for a toss to home plate, and the error allowed Ha-Seong Kim to easily score.
“I’ve got to make that play. That was an easy out at home right there. The bunt was right back to me. If I make that play, the inning is a lot different,” Kerhsaw lamented.
“That’s on me. That was super easy. Super frustrating mistake there, but obviously walking people is not fun. Give up a first-pitch hit, that’s no big deal. But walking a guy to get that guy in scoring position is not what you want there.”
The Padres went on to score two more runs in the inning and pushed across three more in the fourth to break the game open.
Clayton Kershaw’s first start without strikeout
The subpar outing amounted to the first time in Kershaw’s career he didn’t have at least one strikeout in a start during the regular season. In total he induced just two swings and misses.
“Just need to pitch better,” he said of the rarity. “Sometimes it happens. There’s a lot you can overanalyze when you pitch bad, but for right now I’m just going to say it was bad and try to pitch better in the next one.”
Kershaw’s streak with one or more strikeouts was snapped at 423 regular-season starts. It was the longest such streak since the mound was 60 feet, six inches in 1893.
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