PHOENIX _ Two months from Wednesday, the Los Angeles Dodgers will play Game 3 of the National League Division Series on the road. Most likely, they will start Alex Wood, their 26-year-old All-Star left-hander. Most likely, they will play either Arizona or Colorado, whichever team wins the National League wild-card game.
If it is Arizona, the Diamondbacks will most likely start ex-Dodger Zack Greinke at Chase Field, making Wednesday's game quite the postseason preview. In Wood vs. Greinke at Chase Field Part 1, the Dodgers surpassed the Diamondbacks, 3-2, spurred by a seventh-inning rally against a tiring Greinke.
Both starting pitchers held their opponents to a solo shot through five innings.
Cody Bellinger struck first with a solo shot to begin the second. Greinke threw him a fastball up and in, grazing the edge of the strike zone. Bellinger whipped his bat and generated enough torque to propel the ball to right field.
That was the Dodgers' lone hit until the seventh, though they drew four walks up to that point, including a disputed one in the sixth by Chris Taylor. For the ninth pitch of their battle, Greinke fired a fastball along the apparent black of home plate. Taylor laid off, home-plate umpire Alfonso Marquez called it a ball, and Greinke crouched in disbelief, displaying more emotion than he ever had as a Dodger.
Wood permitted his first hit in the second, a double by J.D. Martinez, and a solo shot to Paul Goldschmidt in the fourth. He left a fastball over the middle of plate, and Goldschmidt banged it off of the batter's eye.
Arizona's other activity was sparse. David Peralta worked a two-out walk in the third, and Greinke notched a fifth-inning single off of Justin Turner's glove. Wood responded by pumping a fastball past Peralta for an inning-ending strikeout.
Then, in the sixth, Yasiel Puig cursed himself when he could not catch A.J. Pollock's ground-rule double to right. That proved consequential when Martinez dug up a low changeup and stroked it to center field for the go-ahead single.
The Dodgers' rejoinder was a seventh-inning rally. With the count 3-and-2 to begin, Greinke threw Bellinger another up-and-in fastball, a little lower than earlier. Bellinger again anticipated it and lined a double to right field. With two outs, Greinke missed with a 1-and-0 changeup and Joc Pederson smacked a tying double to right. Two pitches later, Puig snuck a grounder into right field. As he neared first base, he happily motioned for Pederson to run home.
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts deployed Josh Fields in the seventh. When Fields set down the Diamondbacks in seven pitches, Roberts stuck with the right-hander for the eighth and earned another quick inning thanks to a Goldschmidt double play. After beginning to warm with a man on in the eighth, Kenley Jansen waited out the Dodgers' challenge for insurance runs in the top of the ninth. He entered for the bottom of the inning and secured his 29th save, his lone misstep a hit batsman.
It was the Dodgers' 80th victory, and their 12th consecutive in games decided by one run, dating to June 28.
