Everything was going well for the Los Angeles Dodgers in Wednesday night’s game against the Chicago Cubs as they took a 3-0 lead into the bottom of the sixth after Cody Bellinger launched his 12th home run of the season.
It all went downhill from there though when the Cubs scored six runs of their own, all with two outs in the sixth inning and then added another in the seventh and were able to hang on to beat the Dodgers for the second straight night, 7-6.
Walker Buehler was the starting pitcher for the Dodgers and despite not striking out any batters, he was able to keep the Cubs off the scoreboard through his first five innings of work.
Buehler picked up his first strikeout to begin the sixth, but he later allowed a hit and issued a walk to bring up Javier Baez to represent the tying run with two on and two outs.
Buehler got ahead of him 0-2 with two fastballs, but then he went to his breaking ball but hung it in the middle of the plate. Baez took a big swing and did not miss, launching a game-tying home run to left field to mark the end of Buehler’s night.
After the loss, Buehler discussed his outing and he was not all that pleased with his command despite his ability to get guys out until that sixth inning, as seen on SportsNet LA:
“Just a little sporadic. I was spraying it a little bit, but enough to keep them off the barrel for the most part; at least with the fastball. I got some swings that guys feel like they’re on it and put in the air, and that’s fine. They’re outs. I don’t really care how it comes.”
Buehler did not have much of a Spring Training this year so that could be a reason that his command has been a bit off through his first five outings.
He was coming off his best start of the year last week against the Cincinnati Reds and then kept the Cubs off the scoreboard until making one bad pitch to Baez, so perhaps Buehler is beginning to turn a corner and will build off it in his next start.
