Dodgers ride fourth-inning homers and Yamamoto’s 10 strikeouts past Braves

Two swings changed the night

For three innings, Chris Sale and Yamamoto kept the game in a narrow channel. Then the Dodgers turned the fourth into the decisive stretch. Andy Pages reached and scored when Enrique Hernández drove a 406-foot homer to left, and Freddie Freeman followed later in the inning with a 399-foot shot to right-centre. In a game that produced only four total runs, that burst was enough to redraw the entire contest.

The Dodgers did not overwhelm Atlanta with constant traffic. They struck out 12 times, drew only two walks and finished with eight hits in 36 at-bats. What they did have was damage at the top end of their contact. Hernández supplied two RBIs with one swing, Freeman added the other run, and Pages and Mookie Betts paced the hit column with two apiece.

Atlanta answered in the fifth but could not build on it. Mauricio Dubón came home on Drake Baldwin’s groundout to first, trimming the deficit to 3-1, while Brewer Hicklen moved to second and Lane Thomas advanced to third on the play. That was the Braves’ one breakthrough. They did not score again over the final four innings.

Yamamoto set the tone, and the Dodgers finished it cleanly

Yamamoto’s line was the backbone of the result: seven innings, four hits, one run, one walk and 10 strikeouts on 98 pitches. Atlanta put only six total bases on the board all night and did not hit a home run. The right-hander’s ability to miss bats without losing the strike zone gave Los Angeles room to let those two fourth-inning home runs stand up.

The final two innings were shorter, but they mattered. Tanner Scott worked the eighth, allowing one walk and striking out two, and Edwin Díaz handled the ninth with one hit allowed and no runs. Combined, the Dodgers’ staff struck out 12, walked two and limited Atlanta to a .156 team batting average for the night.

Sale was hardly poor, even in defeat. The Braves left-hander struck out seven without issuing a walk across five innings, but the two home runs accounted for all three runs against him. After Sale departed, Atlanta’s bullpen kept the game within reach. Dylan Dodd, Dylan Lee, Brent Suter and Raisel Iglesias covered four innings, allowed one hit and piled up five strikeouts.

Our take

This was a tidy example of how a power-first offence can survive an uneven overall night. The Dodgers’ .263 on-base percentage in the game and 12 strikeouts suggest plenty of empty at-bats, but two balls leaving the yard covered for those quieter stretches. That formula works when the pitching is this sharp; it becomes far less comfortable when it is not.

For Atlanta, the more pressing issue was the lack of authoritative contact. The Braves managed five hits, only one extra-base hit and no home runs, while striking out 12 times. They did force 136 pitches from the Dodgers, so the game was not empty of competitive at-bats, but the pressure rarely turned into more than a single run. A club that puts runners on only sporadically needs more than one productive out to change a night like this.

The other detail that should bother Atlanta is the extra help it gave away. The Braves were charged with two errors, and the Dodgers also reached once on catcher interference. In a 3-1 game, those small concessions matter because they widen the cost of every mistake a pitcher makes. Los Angeles did not need a big offensive avalanche. It needed one clean inning, dependable starting pitching and a bullpen that protected a narrow lead, and it got all three.

Scoring moments

1. 4th Inning

   E. Hernández homered to left (406 feet), Pages scored.

2. 4th Inning

   Freeman homered to right center (399 feet).

3. 5th Inning

   Baldwin grounded out to first, Dubón scored, Hicklen to second, Thomas to third.