MLB

Four Homers Fuels Dodgers To 7-3 Victory Over Rival Giants in Series Finale

Joc Pederson, Adrian Gonzalez, Andre Ethier and Jimmy Rollins all hit home runs as the Los Angeles Dodgers defeated the rival San Francisco Giants 7-3 to take the rubber match.

One night after reshuffling the lineup to feature all right-handers, Don Mattingly littered the lineup full of lefties on Wednesday against Ryan Vogelsong.

The rearranging paid dividends as the Dodgers belted four home runs in three innings off of Vogelsong, all off the bats of left-handed hitters. Joc Pederson, Adrian Gonzalez, Andre Ethier and Jimmy Rollins all dialed in from long distance and the Dodgers took the rubber match of their three game series 7-3.

Pederson who rode the elevator up the lineup from the eight spot to leadoff on Wednesday greeted Vogelsong with a first pitch blast to right center to start the home run barrage.

"It's good that we got to him [Vogelsong] early," said Pederson of the first inning.

Three batters later Gonzalez continued to state his case for NL Player of the Month when his solo-shot left the park for his NL-leading 8th round tripper on the season.

"I was looking fastball and he threw me a curveball," said Gonzalez. "Thankfully I was able to turn on it and hit it out."

After a one out walk to Scott Van Slyke, Ethier joined the home run party with a four-bagger of his own and before Dodgers fans found their seats, it was 4-1 in favor of Los Angeles.

"He made a couple mistakes over the heart of the plate and we capitalized off of them," said Ethier of Vogelsong. "He needs to live on the edges but he made some mistakes tonight."

The bleacher seats at Chavez Ravine were temporarily renamed "Souvenir City" as Rollins led off the bottom half of the third inning with a deep dinger of his own to make it an even four lefties to homer of Vogelsong before he was chased from the game.

Vogelsong (0-2) allowed six runs on five hits (four of them homers) over three short innings. It was the first time in his career that he allowed three home runs in the first inning of a game and just the second San Francisco starter to do it since Matt Cain on April 29, 2013 at Arizona.

"I warmed up fine in the bullpen and felt fine, physically. I just didn't make very good pitchers," said a somber Vogelsong in the losing locker room. "Not all of them were up, but some were, for sure. They weren't terrible pitches, just not as good as they needed to be"

The Giants tried to rally in the top of the 4th when shortstop Brandon Crawford hit a two-run jack off of Dodgers starter Zack Grienke to close the gap at 6-3.

Greinke would tack on an RBI of his own however in the bottom half of the inning when San Francisco right fielder, Justin Maxwell robbed the pitcher of a base hit with a spectacular diving catch. Thankfully, Dodgers catcher Yasmani Grandal acutely tagged up on the play and LA led 7-3.

"We had a lot of games last year where we would score early and let teams back in it," said Mattingly. "I thought tacking on that run after they scored in the top half of the fourth was huge"

Greinke (4-0) continued his dominance over the NL West as the former 2009 AL Cy Young winner allowed three runs on seven hits with six strikeouts over six innings.

Grienke tied a career-high winning his ninth consecutive decision and improved to 16-0 with a 1.79 ERA against the NL West since the start of the 2014 season. In all, Greinke is an eye-popping 22-1 against the NL West since donning Dodger blue in 2013.

"I pitch well against the (NL West), but in order to do what I've done there's a lot of luck," said Greinke of his dominance against the division. "We scored a bunch of runs today, but other times I pitch really good and we don't score many runs. So there's a lot of luck involved."

Adam Liberatore pitched a perfect seventh inning to remain scoreless on the season through 6.1 innings of work.

Yimi Garcia pitched a scoreless ninth as Los Angeles moved to 10-2 at home on the year.

Game Notes:
Former Dodgers pitcher Kazuhisa Ishii threw out the ceremonial first pitch before the game. Ishii made his MLB debut with the Dodgers in 2002.

Brandon McCarthy's Tommy John surgery is scheduled for Thursday.

53,285 were in attendance at Dodger Stadium for "Clayton Kershaw Blanket Night."

Juan Uribe hit a double in the fourth to extend his hitting streak to 11 games. The Dodgers moved to a record of 2-4 against their rivals on the young season.
 

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