Through eight innings the Los Angeles Dodgers only had one hit — courtesy of Kenta Maeda — but they again found late-game magic in a 3-2 walk-off win against the Toronto Blue Jays. The walk-off victory was the Dodgers’ 12th this season and second in as many games.
Their rally began on Max Muncy’s leadoff walk and continued when Cody Bellinger doubled to put the tying runs in scoring position with one out. Corey Seager promptly hit a double of his own to tie it, and then Kiké Hernandez hit a walk-off single up the middle on his bobblehead night to complete the sweep.
Kenta Maeda turned in one of his better starts but the Dodgers were unusually quiet. Maeda’s effort was bested by Jacob Waguespack, as the rookie right-hander more than did his part to help the Blue Jays avoid a series sweep.
Maeda’s one-out single in the third inning represented the Dodgers’ lone hit off Waguespack. A.J. Pollock followed with a walk, but Waguespack proceeded to retire the next 14 batters in a row.
Including grazing Kiké Hernandez with a pitch in the second inning, Waguespack allowed just three baserunners over his seven scoreless innings. The outing was the longest of Waguespack’s young career in 10 games (seven starts).
He had twice gone six innings, including last doing so when he held the Tampa Bay Rays scoreless on Aug. 5.
Waguespack’s effort spoiled Maeda’s bounce-back performance as he pitched with the aggression the Dodgers have regularly sought. Maeda’s six innings of work validated a sentiment manager Dave Roberts held going into the game.
“I think we’ll see that tonight,” he answered when asked about Maeda’s aggression. “But again, it’s cat-and-mouse. He’s not going to just live and die by the fastball. You’ve got to sequence it the right way.
“I do believe that setting yourself up, making these guys conscious of the ball in and respecting the fastball, everyone knows when it starts to get a little bit hot, there’s stress, Kenta goes to the secondaries. When you have a track record of doing that, your margin starts to decrease. To now get guys off of that is a challenge for Kenta, and he’s up to it.”
Toronto manufactured a run when Randal Grichuk opened the second inning with an infield single that beat the shift, and Billy McKinney lined a base hit into right field. Maeda minimized the damage by inducing two groundouts, with the second scoring a run.
Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s solo home run off Maeda provided insurance in the sixth inning, but the Dodgers bullpen – Caleb Ferguson, Yimi Garcia and Casey Sadler – were flawless to keep the deficit at two and set the stage for another walk-off.
