LOS ANGELES – Six weeks after taking a nine-game lead in the National League West, the Dodgers’ sizable advantage was not just dwindling; it was gone.
The reigning World Series champions entered a critical weekend wobbling, having lost 21 of their last 33 games. They hoped a visit from the revamped rivals who overtook them for the division lead might help them discover the urgency and intensity that had been missing.
Consider them found.
After sweeping the San Diego Padres at Dodger Stadium, the Dodgers reclaimed their place atop the NL West, reestablished the pecking order in one of MLB’s most hotly-contested division races and reinforced the belief that the last couple of months of substandard play isn’t necessarily indicative of what’s to come for one of the most talented rosters in baseball.
“I think it might reinforce it to others outside of the locker room,” manager Dave Roberts said. “But it is something of, like, we’ve got to get going and not just talk about it.”
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This weekend was a start.
Intensity, Roberts explained, is not always overt, the way it was the last time the Dodgers and Padres met in the middle of June, when the memories of last year’s contentious division series clash still lingered. A condensed slate of games between the two rivals invited simmering tension. Over the course of seven matchups in 11 days, there were 11 hit batters, a benches-clearing incident, three suspensions and words exchanged between players and managers.
Between the lines, though, the Dodgers clearly had the upper hand, taking five of those seven contests. The Padres, with a lineup lacking depth at that point, were more playoff hopefuls than legitimate championship contenders.
That has since changed.
For the past two months, the Padres have again demonstrated their willingness to do whatever it takes to win now. Their litany of moves at the deadline, which emptied the upper levels of their farm system in an effort to bring a championship to San Diego as quickly as possible, epitomized that.
The Dodgers, meanwhile, scoffed at the prices for top talents on the market and have since paid the price for a quiet deadline, scuffling over the past few weeks with a tattered bullpen while the Padres reap the rewards of their audaciousness.
With a new-look roster, the Padres entered this weekend — and a stretch of six crucial games in 10 days against the Dodgers — having won 14 of their last 17 games. In the process, they went from trailing in the division by six games on July 25 to leading it by one less than three weeks later.
“You know, the division isn’t won or lost in the next 10 days,” Clayton Kershaw said. “But it will make an impact. We know that.”
Clayton Kershaw had a vintage outing in Friday’s win over the Padres. (Photo by Harry How/Getty Images)
This time, there was too much at stake for a skirmish between the division rivals.
On Friday afternoon, both managers insisted that what happened in the past remained there. The next 72 hours would prove it. There were no spats, back-and-forth barbs or bench-clearing brouhahas.
It was just a display of dominance by a Dodgers team that got the upper hand back as it eyes a 12th division title in 13 years.
“I think we all know who we are in here,” Freddie Freeman said, “and how good we can be.”
The intensity Roberts sought from his group pertained only to his team’s performance after a lengthy spell of uninspired play.
Entering the weekend, the Dodgers had just been swept by the Angels. In four of their previous five losses, they held a one-run lead in the eighth inning or later. Their depleted bullpen and volatile lineup had prevented the group from reaching its potential.
“I do think that there are some things that we can get that tightened up,” Roberts said. “When you’re playing against a really good ballclub, and it’s going to be 50,000-plus here, excited fans, that kind of heightens intensity and focus.”
So does having Kershaw on the mound.
On Friday at home, Kershaw ended the Dodgers’ four-game skid and lowered his ERA for the year to 3.01 with six innings of one-run ball.
“It’s a game in August, obviously,” Kershaw said. “It’s not that huge a deal. But the way we were going, it felt like a big game for us.”
Before the series began, Roberts said he would manage the series with more urgency, considering the opponent and the circumstances, but added that it’s still not Game 7 of the World Series.
The Friday matchup — a game in which Kershaw was pulled at 76 pitches and Blake Treinen, one of the few healthy high-leverage right-handers in the Dodgers’ bullpen, was asked for only one out — exemplified how the Dodgers are still keeping an eye on the future while recognizing the importance of the present.
“When you have the talent that we do, you just gotta kind of play good baseball,” Roberts said. “And if you do that, we’re going to win more than we lose.”
The Dodgers reclaimed the division lead a day later, letting the Padres run themselves out of first place in a calamity that strayed from the type of play that put San Diego in this position. Within the first two innings of Saturday’s 6-0 thrashing, Dodgers catcher Will Smith had already thrown out three runners on the basepaths, Padres starter Dylan Cease had issued six free passes, and Padres outfielder Jackson Merrill let a two-out fly ball pop out of glove at the warning track in center field to score two runs.
That set the Dodgers up on Sunday to do what they failed to a week ago, when they let a chance to sweep the AL East frontrunners Toronto Blue Jays at home slip away. They did not want a repeat.
Manny Machado and the Padres entered the weekend atop the NL West but are once again behind the Dodgers after a three-game sweep. (Photo by Harry How/Getty Images)
That was evident with who was behind the plate. Smith, their All-Star catcher, doesn’t normally catch in a day game after a night game. This weekend, he caught all three games.
“This is a good time to go for the jugular,” Roberts said.
The Dodgers did just that, attacking early with a three-run homer from Freeman in the first inning, then responding late on a go-ahead homer from Mookie Betts in the eighth inning to finish off the sweep with a 5-4 win. Alex Vesia secured the final five outs after approaching Roberts and telling him he wanted the opportunity in the ninth.
“You gotta win the close games,” Freeman said. “We’ve had our chances to win games by one or two runs, and we just weren’t able to pull them off there in the last week. We were able to pull them off this week…So gotta keep it going, keep our foot on the gas.”
Mookie Betts’ eighth-inning solo shot proved to be the decided in Sunday’s win. (Photo by Emma Sharon/MLB Photos via Getty Images)
As the Dodgers wait for their top bullpen pieces to return to health, this weekend was the formula: clutch hits, sound defense and, most importantly, elite starting pitching performances from a rotation that is finally healthy and rounding into form.
Starters Kershaw, Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow combined to surrender three runs in 17 innings against the Padres’ reloaded lineup. The Dodgers have now won eight times in 10 matchups against the Padres this year to secure the season series.
The teams will meet for the final time this regular season next weekend in San Diego, when the Dodgers’ urgency and intensity will be tested again.
“I don’t think anyone in that clubhouse doubted our abilities and how good we can be,” Roberts said. “Honestly, it was just good to play a really good series, start to finish. I think we respect those guys, I think they respect us, and now we’ve got to turn the page and move on.”
Rowan Kavner is an MLB writer for FOX Sports. He previously covered the L.A. Dodgers, LA Clippers and Dallas Cowboys. An LSU grad, Rowan was born in California, grew up in Texas, then moved back to the West Coast in 2014. Follow him on X at @RowanKavner.
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