NEW YORK _ It requires a truly wretched effort from a pitching staff to lose a game in which your offense hits six home runs. Lucky for the Los Angeles Dodgers, on Sunday they hit seven.
An 11th-inning solo shot by Justin Turner prevented the Dodgers from the embarrassment of wasting a power outburst in an 8-7 victory over the New York Mets. Turner went deep to finish off a sweep at Citi Field and remove any guilt from the conscience of Rich Hill and Erik Goeddel.
Enrique Hernandez led the game off with a homer and tied it with a second in the sixth inning. Cody Bellinger bashed a pair of his own. Max Muncy and Joc Pederson went deep, too. But it was not enough to finish the game in regulation.
The barrage provided support for Hill, who completed five ragged innings. He permitted four runs as he was penalized for hitting three batters, including Mets outfielder Brandon Nimmo twice. Hill could not build off his six-inning gem against the Chicago Cubs earlier in this road trip.
The homers prevented Hill from wearing a loss. They also afforded a three-run lead to Goeddel in the eighth. Goeddel vaporized that in efficient fashion, yielding a walk, a single and a game-tying shot from catcher Kevin Plawecki.
At the start, the Dodgers benefited from the decisions of their hosts. Competence does not overflow in Flushing. Mets pitcher Jason Vargas told team officials about his strained calf on Wednesday. The Mets still scheduled him to start on Sunday, and declined to fly in a pitcher from their triple-A affiliate in Las Vegas. When Vargas irritated his calf during drills on Saturday, the Mets were left without a starter.
On Sunday morning, the Mets informed the Dodgers that reliever Jerry Blevins would start the game. Blevins throws with his left hand. The Dodgers countered by leading off with Hernandez, who slugs well against left-handed pitchers. The setup worked well for the Dodgers: Hernandez bashed the third pitch of the game for a leadoff homer.
Blevins had a more favorable matchup the next at-bat. Muncy is a left-handed hitter. The platoon advantage did not matter. Muncy clubbed his 15th homer of the season on a belt-high, 87-mph fastball.
The lead did not last. Hill lost the handle of a fastball and clipped Mets outfielder Dom Smith in the second inning. Next up was Plawecki, who ripped a curveball into the left-field corner for an RBI double. An inning later, Hill hit Nimmo with a curveball. Hill picked up two outs before serving up a game-tying double from first baseman Wilmer Flores over Pederson's head in center field.
The Dodgers pulled ahead in the fourth with a third home run. Bellinger detonated a misplaced, two-strike fastball from Mets reliever Tim Peterson. Hill frittered the advantage away in the fifth.
Nimmo led off the inning. A cutter from Hill collided with Nimmo's hand. Hill compounded the trouble by flipping a curveball over the plate to Mets second baseman Asdrubal Cabrera. Cabrera lifted the ball out to the party deck in left field for a two-run blast.
Hernandez evened the score in the sixth. The Mets were using their third pitcher, a 27-year-old right-hander with a 5.95 career earned-run average named Chris Beck. When Beck slopped a 2-2 slider down the middle, Hernandez pounced for his team's fourth solo shot of the afternoon.
The fifth took flight in the seventh. Mets reliever Anthony Swarzak tried to sneak a slider past Pederson. Pederson deposited the pitch deep into the second deck of right field, where it crashed into a row of empty seats.
Swarzak stayed in for the eighth. The Dodgers kept pummeling him. They produced a run, without the ball leaving the park, with Hernandez scoring from third base when Matt Kemp bounced into a double play. Then Bellinger stepped in to face Swarzak. An elevated 92-mph fastball cruised to the plate. Bellinger walloped it into the second deck, the same area he visited with a grand slam on Friday night.
