The Los Angeles Dodgers rallied late to pick up an 8-2 victory in the series finale against the San Diego Padres, which kept them from being swept and tied the National League West division race up again.
Dalton Rushing had the biggest hit of the game with a 2-2 tie in the seventh inning. After Andy Pages singled and Michael Conforto walked, Rushing slugged a three-run homer against Jeremiah Estrada to put the Dodgers up 5-2.
But that wasn’t all the scoring for the Dodgers in that inning, as Mookie Betts also singled and Freddie Freeman blasted his second homer of the game to break the score open to 7-2.
Prior to the Dodgers taking a commanding lead in the seventh, they actually got on the board in the first inning.
Shohei Ohtani started them with a leadoff walk, Betts singled, and Freeman walked to load the bases. Teoscar Hernández then hit a sacrifice fly to put them up 1-0, but that was all they were able to score after loading the bases.
The Padres answered back to take the lead in the third inning, started by a one-out single from Jake Cronenworth. Elías Díaz followed with a two-run homer that put the Padres up 2-1, and that score remained until the sixth inning.
Freeman hit his first homer of the game to tie it at two in the sixth, and set up what proved to be a game-winning rally the next inning.
Ohtani also slugged a solo home run in the eighth inning to make it an 8-2 game. It was his 45th homer of the season.
Both starting pitchers also turned in excellent starts. Yoshinobu Yamamoto threw six innings of two-run ball, allowing just four hits with six strikeouts and two walks.
Yamamoto now has a 2.90 ERA this season over 139.2 innings while striking out 157 hitters with a 1.07 WHIP.
Nick Pivetta matched him with two runs over six innings while giving up two hits, walking three and striking out seven. It was the third consecutive start the Padres had one of their starters go six innings with two runs or fewer against the Dodgers.
Dodgers re-take NL West lead
The Dodgers entered one game behind the Padres in the NL West race, and both teams now hold the same 74-56 record, which has them tied atop the division.
However, the Dodgers won the season series against the Padres, so they hold the tiebreaker if the two teams were to finish tied at the end of the season, effectively giving them ownership of first place.
The Padres would have to finish one full game ahead of the Dodgers to win the division.
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