The Los Angeles Dodgers continued to go cold with runners in scoring position but benefitted from wild Chicago Cubs pitching to come away with a 4-1 win on another chilly afternoon at Wrigley Field.
Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched five scoreless innings to earn the first win of his young MLB career. The start was also Yamamoto’s first in a road game, as the Dodgers were the designated home team when he debuted against the San Diego Padres in the Seoul Series.
Yamamoto keeping the Cubs scoreless was no easy task as they loaded the bases in each of the first two innings. In his opening frame, Yamamoto faced the jam with nobody out before wiggling out of trouble behind three consecutive strikeouts.
Max Muncy’s error in the second inning loaded the bases with two outs but Yamamoto kept the game knotted in a scoreless tie by striking out Cody Bellinger.
The game remained scoreless until the Dodgers put together a three-run fifth inning. Singles by Austin Barnes and Shohei Ohtani put two on with one out, and Teoscar Hernández kept the inning alive after a pitching change by drawing a four-pitch walk.
A wild pitch then brought a run in and Muncy added onto the Dodgers’ lead with a two-run single. Miguel Rojas added insurance in the eighth inning on a fly ball to right field that got lost in the sun and dropped for an RBI single.
Ohtani, Muncy, Rojas and Barnes tied for the game-high with two hits each.
Dodgers streak snapped
Although the Dodgers bounced back with a win, their streak of scoring at least five runs in every game to begin the season was snapped at 10.
However, they have scored a minimum of four runs in their first 11 games this year, becoming just the fifth team in MLB history to accomplish the feat since 1900. The 1978 Boston Red Sox hold the MLB record by starting their season with 18 consecutive games of scoring at least four runs.
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