{"id":922615,"date":"2026-07-09T06:48:26","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T06:48:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/922615\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T06:48:26","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T06:48:26","slug":"mookie-betts-eighth-inning-single-gives-dodgers-the-win-over-the-rockies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/922615\/","title":{"rendered":"Mookie Betts’ eighth-inning single gives Dodgers the win over the Rockies"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Mookie Betts\u2019 first hit this series against the Rockies couldn\u2019t have come at a more opportune time. With the crack of the ball against his bat, Tommy Edman scored from third, giving the Dodgers<\/a> the lead.<\/p>\n

And as Betts reached first, he pointed to Freddie Freeman, whose single put Edman in scoring position. It had taken a team effort to overcome another middling start from Roki Sasaki, and Betts, who had little to show before his game-winning hit, took the chance to highlight the joint contribution in the Dodgers\u2019 4-3 rubber-match win<\/a> over Colorado (38-56).<\/p>\n

\u201cIt feels great,\u201d Betts said of his nine-pitch battle. \u201cHelping the boys win, that\u2019s really all it is. We play the game to win, and coming through in a big moment is kind of what, when you\u2019re a kid, playing in the backyard, getting that hit is what you always strive to do, and fortunately, I was able to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Given a three-run lead in the first inning, brought to the Dodgers by a wild pitch and Kyle Tucker\u2019s two-run, line-drive single to left field, Sasaki seemed set up for success.<\/p>\n

Still, he gave away the lead as quickly as it came. In the second inning, he left a fastball too far over the plate, and third baseman Kyle Karros drove the ball over the left-center wall. The slider he dealt two batters later to second baseman Edouard Julien also crossed the zone too far over the plate, and Julien rounded the bases with another homer. In the third, a sacrifice fly by Mickey Moniak evened the scored, 3-3.<\/p>\n

Sasaki\u2019s troubles this season have been hard to pin down since his last win on May 23, as Sasaki tries to claw back the triple-digit velocity that\u2019s escaped him as of late.<\/p>\n

Against the Rockies, his fastball topped out at 99.1 miles per hour before steadily dropping to 98. He had managed five strikeouts in his six innings when manager Dave Roberts replaced him with Jack Dreyer, though the three earned runs couldn\u2019t be ignored.<\/p>\n

But Roberts also acknowledged the possibility that the pitcher had been tipping his pitches, possibly since he was playing in Japan, and Sasaki has tried to address it after a three-inning, six-run start last week. Even if he had fully self-corrected, his control issues remain. In the third inning, he walked the tying runner, Brett Sullivan.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been working on a lot of things like the tipping stuff,\u201d Sasaki said through interpreter Kensuke Okubo. \u201cAlso, I need to make quality pitches.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sasaki regained some of his confidence in the fourth when he worked out of a two-base jam with two strikeouts and a flyball to right, something that didn\u2019t go unnoticed by Roberts.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can see the demeanor walking off the mound, the confidence,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cFor me, it was more of let him end on a high note, feeling good about his outing, and then go from there.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Dodgers\u2019 problems were compounded by Alex Call wasting the team\u2019s two challenges in his at-bat in the first inning when the team had already taken the lead. And maybe it would\u2019ve been excusable if Call had driven in the runners on first and second, but instead he ended the inning on a strikeout, stranding both. Roberts called the situation an \u201coutlier\u201d and didn\u2019t feel as though he needed to have a conversation with Call regarding the situation.<\/p>\n

After the three-run first, the Dodgers (61-33<\/a>) remained hitless until Max Muncy laced a double down the right-field line in the sixth, though to little avail. As the innings ticked forward, Colorado\u2019s chances seemed to increase. The Rockies hold the best league batting average (.297)<\/a> in the eighth and ninth innings (the Dodgers are fourth with .268). And the Dodgers relievers, within the same constraints, have a 3.83 ERA<\/a> \u2014 not bad, but not in the top 10 either.<\/p>\n

\"Third <\/p>\n

Third baseman Max Muncy can\u2019t get his glove on a line-drive double by Kyle Karros in the fourth inning.<\/p>\n

(Gina Ferazzi\/Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n

So when Alex Vesia struggled against the Rockies in the eighth inning and Muncy suffered a throwing error, Colorado seemed in position to score with the bases loaded and one out. Vesia struck out TJ Rumfield and Edgardo Henriquez (4-0), his replacement, retired Karros on a fly ball to right.<\/p>\n

After Betts\u2019 single allowed the Dodgers to take the lead, Tanner Scott (13) shut down the Rockies with back-to-back strikeouts, avoiding the team\u2019s eighth series loss of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cDidn\u2019t feel great,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cFortunately, we won a series, but that\u2019s not the kind of way you want to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mookie Betts\u2019 first hit this series against the Rockies couldn\u2019t have come at a more opportune time. With…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":922616,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5123],"tags":[20698,1582,276,4439,2442,89616,2961,5615,224,5337,2749,8331,51384,20418,11638,169518,8330,220239,372378,2030],"class_list":["post-922615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-ball","tag-ca","tag-california","tag-colorado","tag-dodgers","tag-innings","tag-la","tag-lead","tag-los-angeles","tag-losangeles","tag-mookie-betts","tag-muncy","tag-plate","tag-rockies","tag-roki-sasaki","tag-scoring-position","tag-strikeout","tag-team-effort","tag-wild-pitch","tag-win"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116888687508014698","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=922615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922615\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/922616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=922615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=922615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=922615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}