Fresh off being named National League Pitcher of the Month, Yoshinobu Yamamoto flirted with a no-hitter and the Los Angeles Dodgers began their longest road trip of the season with a 2-1 win against the Atlanta Braves.
Yamamoto didn’t allow a hit until the sixth inning when Austin Riley doubled with two outs. Up to that point the Braves’ lone baserunners came via Marcell Ozuna’s walks with two outs in the first and fourths inning.
Yamamoto still needed to escape danger early in the start as multiple hard-hit balls went back to the mound or over his head.
The right-hander went on to pitch six scoreless innings in one of his better starts of the season. It was a bounce-back effort from Yamamoto not being sharp and laboring in a showdown against Pittsburgh Pirates ace Paul Skenes last week.
The Dodgers needed every bit of Yamamoto’s brilliance as Grant Holmes got through three perfect innings on a mere 31 pitches. He struck out Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman to begin the game.
The first hit for either team was Betts’ one-out single in the fourth inning that ricocheted off Holmes’ backside. He was checked on by a Braves trainer before remaining in the game and running into trouble.
Freeman then reached on an infield single and Teoscar Hernández worked a walk to load the bases. But all the Dodgers could muster with the golden opportunity was one run on Will Smith’s sacrifice fly.
Betts and Freeman nevertheless extended their hitting streaks to five and seven games, respectively.
Betts later hit a solo home run off Holmes that extended the Dodgers’ lead to 2-0 in the sixth inning. The former Dodgers pitching prospect went six-plus innings and set a career high with nine strikeouts.
Betts’ long ball proved to be the difference as Kirby Yates gave up a solo homer upon entering the game in the seventh inning.
Alex Verdugo, who like Holmes was picked by the Dodgers in the 2014 MLB Draft, went 0-for-4 with one strikeout against his former team.
The night included a rain delay of 1 hour and 13 minutes that began in the top of the ninth inning. The Dodgers’ winning streak now sits at six games.
Dodgers undefeated vs. Braves
The Dodgers swept the Braves in a series at Dodger Stadium earlier this year and with a win on Friday night improved to 4-0 in their head-to-head matchups so far this season. Atlanta fell to 0-7 while L.A. was 8-0 upon completing the sweep last month, good for the best start to a season by a defending World Series champion.
The Braves then went 14-9 between their losses to the Dodgers, who were 13-10 over that same stretch.
Have you subscribed to the Dodger Blue YouTube channel? Be sure to ring the notification bell to watch player interviews, participate in shows and giveaways, and stay up to date on all Dodgers news and rumors!
