ANAHEIM, Calif. _ Five MVPs took the field at Angel Stadium on Friday night. Two of them, Cody Bellinger and Clayton Kershaw, carried to the Los Angeles Dodgers to a 7-4 victory over the Angels.
Kershaw dazzled, spinning seven innings of one-hit ball to lead the Dodgers to their National League-leading 14th win.
But Bellinger stole the show. He drilled two homers, marking the 12th multi-homer game of his career and first of the season.
The results came as a relief. Bellinger has been in a deep funk. He entered Friday's game batting .165 with two home runs and a .489 on-base-plus-slugging percentage _ a far cry from the .305 average and 1.035 OPS he posted on the way to an MVP award last year.
When asked if Bellinger might be trying to live up to the MVP tag, manager Dave Roberts conceded the point.
"There might be something to that," he said. "Whether the player admits it or not, when you're following up an MVP campaign, you certainly put expectations on yourself. But our messaging has been just go out there, compete, take good at-bats and help us win baseball games.
"But individually, I'm sure there's some element of 'I want to kind of want to do what I did last year.' And that's natural."
To ameliorate the pressure, the Dodgers dropped Bellinger to fifth in the batting order for the first time this season.
Bellinger was held hitless in his first two at-bats but the decision ultimately proved fruitful.
Bellinger's blasts, in the sixth and eighth innings, served to stretch the Dodgers' lead over the Angels. As for fellow MVPs Mike Trout and Albert Pujols? They remained in the background for the Angels. And Mookie Betts was mostly silent for the Dodgers.
Fresh off a six-homer night, the Dodgers took a 2-0 lead in the third inning playing small ball. Austin Barnes led off with a single and Betts reached second base on a groundball bobbled by third baseman Anthony Rendon. Corey Seager grounded into a fielder's choice before Justin Turner shot an RBI single into right field. Seager scored from third when Turner slid hard enough into second base to topple the Angels' Tommy La Stella, preventing him from turning a double play on AJ Pollock's chopper.
The Angels failed to manufacture runs in the same fashion before a two-run rally in the eighth. Kershaw had handcuffed them for seven innings.
Kershaw was making his third start after beginning the season on the injured list with a back injury. He tossed 5-2/3 scoreless innings against the Arizona Diamondbacks in his debut. He stumbled in the second, allowing four runs on seven hits across 4-1/3 innings opposite the San Francisco Giants.
Friday resembled the first outing. His fastball averaged 92 mph _ a strong indicator of success. He issued a walk to start the second inning but didn't allow a hit until Rendon lofted a leadoff home run in the fifth. It was Rendon's fifth homer of the season and fourth in four games.
The Angels, held to two walks and Rendon's homer against Kershaw, mustered little else.
Kershaw's performance dwarfed the six-inning effort from Angels starter Patrick Sandoval, whose career-opening winless streak extended to 12 consecutive starts.
Besides the third-inning hiccup, Sandoval mostly cruised through his first five turns on the mound. He needed 59 pitches to get through five innings. He threw first-pitch strikes to 17 of the first 20 batters he faced.
Then Turner drew a walk to lead off the sixth inning. Two batters later, Sandoval was throwing his head back in frustration.
Bellinger had sent his first homer of the night screaming into the right-field corner.
As the ball sliced down the line, Sandoval looked pointedly at the ball gripped in his hand. Bellinger had grabbed hold of a high slider. None of the previous 16 sliders Sandoval offered the Dodgers had been put in play. Of 11 swings made against it, seven came up empty.
