LOS ANGELES _ A highly anticipated pitcher's duel between Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw and Chicago Cubs left-hander Jon Lester turned into a power-point presentation on Sunday, the teams combining to club seven home runs and neither esteemed starter lasting five innings.
The Dodgers weathered one of the worst regular-season starts of Kershaw's career, riding homers by Cody Bellinger, Enrique Hernandez, Austin Barnes and Yasiel Puig to a 9-4 victory to complete a three-game sweep of the defending World Series-champion Cubs.
Kershaw, with sporadic command of his fastball, slider and curve, was rocked for four earned runs and a career-high-tying 11 hits in 4 1/3 innings, striking out six and walking two.
The three-time National League Cy Young Award winner, who entered with a 7-2 record and 2.01 earned-run average, also tied a career high by giving up three home runs. His pitch count (109) was so high that manager Dave Roberts was forced to pull him in the fifth with a 6-4 lead, two outs shy of a potential win.
It was the first time Kershaw had surrendered at least 10 hits, four earned runs and three homers in a regular-season or postseason game.
Lester, who entered with a 3-2 record and 3.19 ERA, was even worse, giving up six earned runs and seven hits in 3 1/3 innings.
Bellinger jumped on a hanging 1-and-2 curve with two aboard in the second, driving his team-leading 10th homer of the season to right for a 3-1 lead. Hernandez, with two on in the third, drove a 3-0 fastball over the left-field wall for a 6-1 lead.
Of Hernandez's 25 hits this season, 19 have gone for extra bases, 14 doubles, one triple and four home runs.
Barnes' solo shot to left-center field off reliever Mike Montgomery pushed the lead to 7-4 in the fifth, and Puig sent a 450-foot blast into the left-center field pavilion off reliever Hector Rondon to make it 9-4 in the seventh.
The first head-to-head matchup between Kershaw and Lester came with an added sense of urgency for the Cubs, who were shut out by the Dodgers and mustered only five hits in the first two games of the series.
"We're all baseball fans," Roberts said before the game. "You look at Jon Lester's track record, how he goes out there and competes. He sees his team on the verge of being swept, so you're gonna see the best from him today.
"And you're gonna see our guy, who smells blood and likes to go for the jugular, and who wants to dominate every single time he sets foot on the mound."
Kershaw did not dominate on Sunday. He struggled from the get-go, giving up a broken-bat single to Javier Baez and a bloop single to Kris Bryant on his first two pitches of the game.
Anthony Rizzo grounded into a fielder's choice. With runners on first and third, Kershaw struck out Ian Happ with a slider and got Jason Heyward to fly to right to escape the jam.
Cubs catcher Willson Contreras capped a 12-pitch at-bat in which he fouled off six two-strike pitches with a homer to right-center field to lead off the second, an inning that ended with Kershaw striking out Bryant with runners on first and third. That gave the Cubs a 1-0 lead.
Kershaw escaped a bases-loaded, two-out jam in the third inning by getting Albert Almora Jr. to ground out, but he was tagged for two homers in the fourth, Baez's solo shot to left and Rizzo's two-run shot deep into the right-field pavilion that pulled the Cubs to within 6-4.
His pitch count at 99 through four innings, Kershaw convinced Roberts to keep him in the game. Then Addison Russell and Almora opened the fifth with singles and advanced on Montgomery's sacrifice bunt.
Roberts summoned reliever Josh Fields, who struck out Baez and Bryant with runners on second and third to snuff out the threat. Fields then retired the side in order in the sixth to earn the victory.
Sergio Romo, Adam Liberatore and Kenley Jansen, who hadn't pitched since Tuesday night, covered the final three innings for the Dodgers, who have won nine of 11 games to improve to 31-20 entering a seven-game trip to St. Louis and Milwaukee.
