The Los Angeles Dodgers cruised to a 9-3 win over the Athletics on Tuesday night behind another solid start from Justin Wrobleski.
The left-hander went seven innings for the sixth time in 15 outings this season, allowing three runs on seven hits and collecting a career-high 11 strikeouts.
Wrobleski earned his 10th win of the season, joining Aaron Ashby of the Milwaukee Brewers and the Philadelphia Phillies’ Cristopher Sanchez as the only pitchers to reach that number so far. Wrobleski is proud of the accomplishment and gave credit to his Dodgers teammates, via Bill Plunkett of the Southern California News Group:
“Ten wins is great. That means you’re pitching pretty well,” Wrobleski said. “But we bang. So it’s a little combo of that. … You want 10 wins, 20 wins kind of deal. It’s super cool. But it’s not something where I set out to get a certain number of wins this year, obviously because I had no idea where I was going to be role-wise.
“It’s something I’m super happy with it. But at the end of the day we bang so you can get a lot of wins if you go deep in games and go five innings. That’s more of a team thing than it is a performance thing for me but it’s super cool.”
In addition, Wrobleski became one of only two Dodgers pitchers over the last decade to earn 10 wins in a season before the start of July, joining Clayton Kershaw, who did it three times in 2016, 2017, and 2023.
Wrobleski, who isn’t much of a strikeout pitcher, became the first Dodger with 11 punch outs in a start since Blake Snell last September. He attributed his high strikeout total to executing his pitches and finding success with his fastball:
“I think the execution was just a little better,” Wrobleski said of the season-high strikeout total. “I think I did a good job of throwing the fastball up when I wanted to and throwing it at the bottom when I wanted to and just kind of moving it around. Everything felt pretty solid. The swing-and-miss was great but I was just trying to make pitches.”
Wrobleski’s excellent start came on a night where Dave Roberts earned his 1,000th win as a manager. The Dodgers skipper previously advocated for the 25-year-old to make his first All-Star Game amid what has been a career year on the mound.
Justin Wrobleski’s 2026 stats
Wrobleski has been a pleasant surprise for the Dodgers this season after initially being viewed as more of a swingman coming into the year. Through 15 appearances (14 starts), he owns a 10-2 record with a 2.80 ERA, 3.49 FIP and 1.01 WHIP in 93.1 innings pitched.
Wrobleski has found success pitching in an old-school way, focusing more on getting soft contact and quick outs, rather than trying to rack up strikeouts. With that, he has averaged more than six innings per start while striking out just 6.2 hitters per nine, but only walking a National League-best 1.7 per nine.
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