Emmet Sheehan has a long way to go before he starts drawing comparisons to Orel Hershiser, but the rookie right-hander did well to channel the nickname — and the attitude that goes with it — of the former pitcher who was inducted into the Legends of Dodger Baseball on Saturday night: Bulldog.
Displaying an attacking mentality and a confidence that was noticeably absent in his previous start, Sheehan blanked the Cincinnati Reds on two hits over five innings, striking out five and walking one, in an eventual 3-2 Dodgers victory before a crowd of 51,015 in Chavez Ravine.
“The focus was just being on the attack, trusting my stuff in the zone,” said Sheehan, who gave up 17 earned runs and 17 hits in 12⅓ innings over his previous three starts. “I think before, I was a little on the defensive, which is not the way I like to pitch. I got back to it this week, for sure.”
The Dodgers had just two hits, but both were Max Muncy home runs, a two-run shot to right field in the first inning and a tie-breaking, two-out, solo shot to right on a 3-and-0 pitch from Reds starter Luke Weaver in the sixth, giving the slugger 27 homers on the season and 14 multi-homer games in his career.
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Muncy also staked Sheehan to an early lead last Sunday in Texas with a first-inning grand slam, but Sheehan pitched tentatively, yielding eight runs and eight hits in 3⅔ innings and walking five, all of whom scored, in an eventual 8-4 loss to the Rangers.
“When I see 92 [mph] on the radar gun, that’s showing me he’s aiming the baseball, and not being free and easy and attacking, and you see a lot of non-competitive pitches,” manager Dave Roberts said after that game. “Big-league hitters, they smell fear, they see blood, and when there’s a weakness, they’re gonna go after you.”
Sheehan was the aggressor Saturday night, from the 96.5-mph fastball he threw on his first pitch to Elly De La Cruz in the first inning to the 96.3-mph fastball he threw on his 82nd and final pitch to Luke Maile in the fifth.
His average fastball velocity of 96.2 mph was up from his season average of 95.5 mph and his 94.6-mph average against the Rangers last weekend. He retired the side in order in the first, fourth and fifth innings and pitched around Maile’s leadoff double in the third.
“There were enough mediocre performances that I just felt he was going to bow his neck and leave it all out there,” Roberts said of Sheehan. “And I saw that on the first pitch tonight, the 97-mph fastball in that first inning. There was a lot of soft contact, weak fly balls. For me, it was a huge step in the right direction.”
But Roberts wouldn’t let Sheehan go through the Reds order for a third time, replacing him with left-hander Caleb Ferguson to start the sixth.
A 2-0 Dodgers lead quickly evaporated in a rally that began with De La Cruz’s double to left center and TJ Friedl’s infield single. Ferguson struck out Matt McLain looking at a 95-mph fastball, but pinch-hitter Kevin Newman lofted a sacrifice fly to medium right field to score De La Cruz and cut the lead to 2-1.
Dodgers right fielder Jason Heyward air-mailed a throw home in an attempt to get the speedy De La Cruz, but he would have been better off hitting the cut-off man or throwing to second to keep the potential tying run at first base.
Instead, Friedl took second on the throw and scored on Spencer Steer’s soft single to left center for a 2-2 tie. Ferguson walked Joey Votto on four pitches and was pulled in favor of right-hander Joe Kelly, who got a huge ovation in his return to Los Angeles after Friday’s trade from the Chicago White Sox.
Kelly threw a wild pitch that advanced the runners to second and third and walked Christian Encarnacion-Strand to load the bases but struck out pinch-hitter Will Benson looking at a 99-mph fastball to end the inning, eliciting another roar from the home crowd.
“Being back here was great — the crowd was awesome,” said Kelly, who spent three seasons (2019-2021) with the Dodgers. “It helped, definitely, having had just four hours of sleep [Friday] night. I was a little bit groggy, but coming in to pitch here is always an adrenaline rush.”
Weaver retired the first two batters in the bottom of the sixth before grooving a 94-mph fastball on a 3-and-0 pitch to Muncy, who sent it 371 feet into the right-field seats.
“I was cheating a little bit,” Muncy said of his 3-0 swing. “We get the green light quite a bit. They usually trust me knowing that I’m not just going to swing to swing. If it’s a pitch where I’m looking, I’ll take a hack at it. But I’ve taken plenty of 3-0 strikes this year when I’ve had the green light.”
Muncy is known for his plate discipline, so Roberts has always been comfortable letting him swing on 3-0 counts.
“I’m more on the side of giving guys the liberties of swinging 3-0, and he’s done it a lot throughout his career,” Roberts said. “Sometimes, guys get a little bit too big and expand the strike zone. But I trust him in that count, and he made me look good right there.”
Dodgers reliever Brusdar Graterol got five outs in the seventh and eighth innings, and Evan Phillips got the last out in the eighth and threw a scoreless ninth for his 13th save, getting the dangerous De La Cruz to fly out to left field with a runner on first to end the game.
The Dodgers (59-44) won for only the second time in six games and maintained their three-game lead over the San Francisco Giants in the National League West.
Clayton Kershaw close
Left-hander Clayton Kershaw, sidelined since late June because of a shoulder injury, threw about 40 pitches to hitters in a three-inning simulated game on Saturday, moving the three-time National League Cy Young Award winner a step closer to a return.
If Kershaw, who is 10-4 with a 2.55 ERA in 16 starts, remains asymptomatic over the next few days and confident about his stuff, he will be activated for next weekend’s series in San Diego. If not, he will probably throw another simulated game of four innings before returning.
Short hops
Mookie Betts was scratched because of a sore right ankle, an injury the leadoff man sustained while performing what Roberts called a “matrix move” to avoid a pitch at his head on Friday night. Betts, who started 98 of the team’s first 102 games and is batting .277 with a .942 OPS, 27 homers and 68 RBIs, is listed as day-to-day. … Reliever Phil Bickford, who went 2-3 with a 5.14 ERA in 36 games this season, was designated for assignment to clear a roster spot for reliever Joe Kelly, the hard-throwing right-hander who was acquired with starter Lance Lynn from the Chicago White Sox on Friday.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
