PHOENIX — They couldn’t stop the running game. They didn’t play clean defense. And they failed to string together enough big hits.
In a dreadful 11-6 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks on Sunday, which sealed an ugly series defeat over four games at Chase Field, the Dodgers’ list of problems was numbered and varied.
“We got beat in every facet,” manager Dave Roberts acknowledged.
None, however, loomed larger than the Dodgers’ sudden, surprising and momentum-sucking inability to do the thing their organization has been best at over the last 10 years.
“The last couple of days, it’s easy to see,” Roberts said. “We didn’t pitch well.”
Indeed, after Dustin May’s strong start in Thursday’s series opener, the Dodgers’ typically dependable staff was put through a spin cycle.
The Dodgers gave up six runs Friday. A dozen on Saturday. Then they let the Diamondbacks (6-4) run wild again on offense in Sunday’s finale — figuratively with the bats, as they racked up 16 hits (12 of them singles) and went eight for 19 with runners in scoring position; and literally on the bases, where they were successful in all five stolen-base attempts.
Rookie right-hander Michael Grove struggled in his second start of the season, yielding nine runs and 12 hits while recording just 10 outs. The bullpen was spotty as well, with Caleb Ferguson and Shelby Miller combining to give up two runs in the fifth inning that turned a lopsided score into a full-on blowout.
In four games against the Diamondbacks — who are hardly the 1927 New York Yankees, projected by FanGraphs to have a bottom-third offense entering the season — the Dodgers surrendered 31 runs, tied for the club’s second most in a series this century; gave up 48 hits, including 10 or more in three straight games for the first time since June in Coors Field; and blew early-game leads in all three losses.
“They did a good job,” said catcher Austin Barnes, whose frustration boiled over with an ejection for arguing balls and strikes in the fifth inning. “They were on a lot of pitches. They were hitting breaking balls, hitting fastballs. We’ve just got to do a better job.”
Pitching was supposed to be a stabilizing force for the Dodgers (5-5) this season, the backbone around which a new-look lineup and wave of young prospects could ease into the voids created by an offseason talent exodus.
Opening day starter Julio Urías has held up his end of the bargain so far. So have May, de facto closer Evan Phillips and, back-to-back home runs in the sixth inning Friday aside, veteran left-hander Clayton Kershaw.
Whenever they have pitched, they have given the Dodgers enough to win.
Few others on the staff can say the same, from key members of the bullpen like Alex Vesia and Brusdar Graterol to key offseason signing Noah Syndergaard and a temporary rotation replacement such as Grove, whom Roberts said will get at least one more start with Tony Gonsolin (ankle) and Ryan Pepiot (oblique) on the injured list.
“I believe that these guys are going to turn things around, figure it out,” Roberts said, with his team posting a 4.68 earned-run average over the season’s first 10 games. “But it’s hard to kind of overanalyze what we did today, or these last couple of games, with run prevention. We just didn’t pitch well.”
And on more than one occasion — such as when Grove gave away a 1-0 lead with two runs in the first inning, or failed to keep a 3-3 tie intact during a three-run third — mistakes on the mound flipped the momentum of games.
“I think our offense is in a decent spot,” Roberts said. “But we were behind an 8-ball today and really couldn’t catch up.”
Roberts tried to find one silver lining amid a postgame malaise.
He pointed to a series against the Philadelphia Phillies from early last year, when the club gave up 33 runs in a similarly ominous four-game debacle, that proved to be nothing more than a blip in the overall arc of the Dodgers’ 111-win season.
“We got through it, we got past it, and we’ll do the same this time too,” Roberts said.
This year, however, the Dodgers have a different team. Bigger questions. And less obvious answers.
They know they will probably only go as far as their pitching will take them.
And this weekend offered a glaring reminder that even that part of the roster is no sure thing either.
“We’ve just got to wash this series,” Roberts said, “because it wasn’t good.”
