Dodgers’ bullpen fatigue leads to extra-innings loss to Marlins
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MIAMI — Most of Tuesday’s game went according to plan for the Dodgers.
Tony Gonsolin produced a solid five-inning outing in his second start back from Tommy John surgery, giving up just two runs.
Shohei Ohtani posted another monster stat line at LoanDepot Park, hitting a tying, second-deck home run in the sixth and a tying double in the seventh in what he calls “one of my favorite stadiums” to play in.
Late in a 5-4 walk-off loss to the Miami Marlins, however, one of the Dodgers’ few early-season concerns finally caught up with them.
The team’s bullpen, quite simply, has been overworked through the first month-plus of the year, leading the majors by a wide margin with 157 innings pitched. And in a game that hung in the balance until the very end, the toll of that strain was unmistakably evident, with manager Dave Roberts turning to two of his lowest-leverage relievers in two of the night’s most critical sequences.
Trying to protect a one-run lead in the sixth, Roberts summoned right-hander Luis García — who promptly gave up two runs that put the Marlins ahead.
James Outman was called up from triple-A Oklahoma City to replace Teoscar Hernández on the roster after Hernández was placed on the IL with a left groin strain.
With the score tied in the bottom of the 10th inning, Roberts turned to recent waiver claim JP Feyereisen — who yielded a bases-loaded walk-off single to Jesús Sánchez.
“We had a few guys that were down, and so that’s kind of the cost of it,” said Roberts, who has warned of the danger of the unit’s rising usage over the last several weeks.
“Absolutely not [do] we want to lead the league in bullpen innings.”
The Dodgers’ bullpen workload hasn’t gotten out of control by design. Injuries to the starting rotation have thrown a wrench into their early-season pitching plans. A lack of consistent length from those who have pitched (the Dodgers are dead last in innings from starting pitchers) hasn’t helped either.
Nonetheless, it has forced their most trusted arms to accrue significant mileage to this point. Kirby Yates and Alex Vesia are tied for the major league lead with 19 outings. Tanner Scott (18) and Anthony Banda (17) are right behind them. Evan Phillips entered the night having pitched in seven of the 14 games the team had played since his late April return from the injured list. And Blake Treinen appeared in eight of their opening 17 contests before going down last month with a forearm injury, currently residing on the injured list alongside another big name in Michael Kopech (who has been sidelined all season by a shoulder problem).
In the interest of having those arms available for the stretch of the season, many of them have been “redlined” now, as Roberts termed it, to try and keep their inning counts under some semblance of control. On Tuesday, it was Yates and Phillips who were both evidently unavailable, each having pitched full innings the night before.
Thus, even with the Dodgers (24-12) holding just a 3-2 lead at the start of the sixth, Roberts had to look elsewhere and called upon García, a right-hander signed this offseason to a minor-league contract before making the club coming out of spring training.
Granted, García had been decent while handling his own robust workload this season, the 13-year veteran entering the game with a 3.78 ERA over 17 outings.
Though Mookie Betts long ago returned to full health, as well as his typical 180-pound playing weight, he has only recently started to look more like his old self again at the plate.
But on Tuesday, his execution finally faltered. Designated hitter Agustin Ramírez led off with a first-pitch double. Connor Norby doubled him home on a two-strike line drive to left field that just evaded a leaping effort from Michael Conforto. Matt Mervis singled on a hanging slider. Just like that, the Marlins had a 4-3 lead.
But after Vesia, Banda and Scott posted zeroes to get the game to extras — Banda’s outing required a bases-loaded 5-2-3 double-play to end the eighth — Roberts was forced into another unappealing pitching decision in the bottom of the 10th.
Claimed off waivers last week from the Arizona Diamondbacks, Feyereisen entered to begin his second stint as a Dodger. In 10 outings with the team last year, he posted an 8.18 ERA.
Roberts tried to get creative, intentionally walking the leadoff man before setting up a five-man infield when a line-drive single loaded the bases.
But Sánchez blasted the second pitch he saw right through the defense, ending the game in walk-off fashion.
The Dodgers’ fears about their mounting bullpen workload had been finally realized.
They bore the inevitable cost that comes with trying to manage it.
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