One swing decided it
Kyle Tucker arrived at the plate with the bases loaded in Miami on Friday night and left the Marlins with nothing to defend. The grand slam settled a 6-2 win, an eighth in a row for Los Angeles, and it capped a 3-for-3 evening that brought Tucker a season-high five runs batted in.
Max Muncy added three hits of his own and Will Smith drove in a run. Otto Lopez went 4-for-5 for Miami, the sort of individual line that tends to disappear in a losing team’s box score.
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Snell gave the bullpen an easy night
Blake Snell worked five and two-thirds innings, struck out eight and conceded a single run on four hits. His record moves to 4-1. Ryan Gusto matched him for endurance, six innings and two runs on five hits, and still took the loss to drop to 1-5, a record that says more about the support behind him than the pitching in front of it.
The bullpen handled the rest without drama, which is worth something in September for a team that has been leaning on its rotation all month.
Eight in a row, and none of them with Ohtani
Cincinnati handed over three of these wins, the last a 14-1 rout in which Yoshinobu Yamamoto struck out 10. Emmet Sheehan struck out 10 himself in his return earlier in that series. Los Angeles have not lost since.
What makes the run notable is who is missing from it. Shohei Ohtani went on the injured list this week and is not expected back before September 23, having already shut down his pitching for the rest of the season. A club built around the most valuable two-way player in the sport has put together its longest winning sequence of the autumn while he watches.
Miami and Los Angeles meet again on Saturday. The Dodgers will be chasing nine.
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