The Los Angeles Dodgers started their road trip with news of Tyler Glasnow suffering a setback in his recovery and a relatively flat offensive performance in a loss to the Atlanta Braves.
Now the Dodgers look to bounce back behind Jack Flaherty, who is coming off a dominant performance against the Cleveland Guardians. Pitching in extreme heat at Dodger Stadium, Flaherty held the Guardians scoreless over 7.1 innings.
The right-hander improved to 5-1 with a 2.61 ERA and 1.16 WHIP in seven starts for the Dodgers.
Flaherty’s success has been much-needed for a Dodgers rotation that was without Yoshinobu Yamamoto until last week, and still doesn’t have Glasnow or Clayton Kershaw.
The Dodgers figure to need more of Flaherty’s best as he starts opposite Chris Sale.
The southpaw is enjoying a resurgent first season with the Braves in which he’s gone 16-3 with a 2.38 ERA and 1.00 WHIP through 27 starts thus far. Most importantly for Sale and the Braves is he’s remained healthy this year, perhaps buoyed by often receiving extra rest between starts.
Sale’s outing on Saturday comes on one extra day of rest after his Sept. 8 start was made on a regular turn in the rotation.
Sale has pitched a combined 13 scoreless innings over his last two starts and collected 16 strikeouts during that span. He faces a Dodgers lineup that includes a new wrinkle with Teoscar Hernández batting third and Freddie Freeman hitting in the cleanup spot.
It’s the first time Freeman is batting fourth in his Dodgers career. Freeman went hitless and had one walk in four plate appearances on Friday night. Braves fans again treated the former franchise cornerstone to a standing ovation during his first at-bat.
Hernández is making a 51st career start in the third spot of a lineup, and fifth this season.
Dodgers lineup
DH: Shohei Ohtani
RF: Mookie Betts
LF: Teoscar Hernández
1B: Freddie Freeman
C: Will Smith
CF: Tommy Edman
SS: Miguel Rojas
3B: Max Muncy
2B: Kiké Hernández
Braves lineup
CF: Michael Harris II
RF: Jorge Soler
DH: Marcell Ozuna
1B: Matt Olson
C: Sean Murphy
LF: Jarred Kelenic
SS: Orlando Arcia
3B: Gio Urshela
2B: Whit Merrifield
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