The Los Angeles Dodgers built on a strong showing in Cactus League play by cruising to a 14-3 win over the Kiwoom Heroes in their first of four games in South Korea.
Freddie Freeman sparked the Dodgers with a two-out solo home run in the first inning and he later doubled to finish 3-for-6 with one walk and a triple shy of hitting for the cycle. Freeman, Jason Heyward and Gavin Lux were the only Dodgers to play all nine innings of the exhibition game.
Heyward contributed with an RBI double in the second inning and Lux followed that with a productive out that extended the Dodgers’ lead to 3-0.
James Outman added an RBI base hit in the third inning and the Dodgers erupted for five runs in the fifth. Heyward started it with a sacrifice fly, and Gavin Lux, Chris Taylor and Hunter Feduccia all contributed with an RBI single to break the game open.
The Dodgers erupted again in the seventh inning, beginning with a Miguel Rojas’ RBI single. Austin Barnes’ sacrifice fly put the Dodgers into double-digits and Heyward’s second double of the game scored Rojas and Miguel Vargas. Taylor capped off the inning with his second RBI single.
Shohei Ohtani had an unusually quiet game, striking out in each of his two at-bats against Ariel Jurado.
A de facto bullpen game panned out well for the Dodgers, with Michael Grove getting them off on the right foot. Grove filled somewhat of an opener role as he got through two perfect innings with four strikeouts.
Grove was followed by Alex Vesia getting through a no-hit inning before Ryan Brasier allowed a run in the fourth. Daniel Hudson, Joe Kelly and Evan Phillips each pitched one inning. All but Phillips managed to keep the Heroes off the board.
Phillips allowed back-to-back two-out singles that led to Sung Mun Song finishing off an 11-pitch at-bat with a double to center that scored a pair of runs.
Kyle Hurt finished out the bullpen game by completing 2.1 innings.
Dodgers in South Korea
Next for the Dodgers is an exhibition game against the Korean national team. Bobby Miller is expected to start and pitch four or five innings, and Gavin Stone is due to appear in the game as well.
Wednesday is Opening Day with the start of the Seoul Series against the San Diego Padres.
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