Dodgers Walk It Off, Then Lose Andy Pages For 4-5 Weeks

The Dodgers came home for a short three-game homestand against the Pittsburgh Pirates, opened it with a walk-off victory and then received the kind of news that has become an all-too-familiar part of their late-season routine.

Tommy Edman delivered the winning hit in the 10th inning, giving the Dodgers a 5-4 victory and their eighth win in their last 11 games. A few hours later, the celebration was tempered by the news that All-Star center fielder Andy Pages will miss approximately four to five weeks with a fractured hand.

For a team that has already spent significant portions of the season adjusting to injuries to key players, the timing is less than ideal.

Pages was hit by a pitch earlier in the game, and what initially appeared to be another routine bit of baseball discomfort turned into something considerably more serious when X-rays revealed the fracture.

"X-Rays unfortunately came up as a fracture, so he'll be out for a while," Dave Roberts said.

There is never a good time to lose an everyday player, but late August has a way of making the timing feel particularly cruel. The Dodgers have dealt with this before. Max Muncy has missed significant time in previous seasons, and Will Smith has also found himself on the injured list when the Dodgers were trying to put together a postseason roster.

Nobody prepares for losing an important player, although by now the Dodgers have certainly had plenty of practice adjusting.

For the moment, they will have to figure out how to replace Pages while continuing to navigate a schedule that offers very little time to feel sorry for themselves.

At least Friday night provided a win to take into the equation.

The Dodgers built a 4-2 lead behind another strong outing from Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who allowed two runs and five hits over 6 1/3 innings while striking out nine. Yamamoto was pulled in the seventh after a leadoff double by Jake Mangum and a hit batter put the tying runs aboard, but Brock Stewart came in and retired the next two hitters to end the threat.

Yamamoto once again gave the Dodgers what they needed from their starter.

The offense did enough early, with Max Muncy hitting a two-run homer in the first inning and Mookie Betts delivering a two-run single with two outs in the third.

But the Dodgers couldn't put the Pirates away.

Oneil Cruz hit a two-run homer off Kyle Hurt in the eighth inning to tie the game at 4-4, setting up another late-night exercise in bullpen management and eventually sending the game into extra innings.

That's where the Dodgers have been remarkably successful.

Pittsburgh's Gregory Soto inherited the automatic runner in the 10th, with Kiké Hernández standing at second. Alex Call pinch-hit and struck out, while Betts was intentionally walked. Kyle Tucker then grounded into a fielder's choice, with Betts retired at second.

That left Edman with two strikes and the game still hanging in the balance.

He didn't waste the opportunity.

Edman lined a pitch into left field, scoring Hernández and giving the Dodgers their fifth extra-inning victory in five attempts this season.

"It feels good to keep the winning streak going and just trying to keep the momentum," Edman said.

For all the things that have gone wrong for the Dodgers over the past several weeks, their performance in extra innings has been remarkably consistent. They remain the only undefeated team in extra innings in the majors.

That is one streak they would probably prefer to keep intact without having to test it quite so often.

Friday's victory also continued what has quietly become a much better stretch of baseball for Los Angeles. The Dodgers have now won eight of their last 11 games, and the sweep in Colorado earlier this week gave them some breathing room after the difficult Milwaukee series.

But the Pages injury changes the conversation.

The Dodgers can absorb a lot of things. They can survive a cold stretch from an individual hitter. They can survive a bullpen problem. They can survive an occasional bad start.

Replacing an All-Star center fielder for more than a month is a different matter.

Pages has been an important part of the Dodgers' outfield, and his absence comes at a point when every remaining game carries increasing weight. There is no convenient time on the schedule to make up for losing a player of his caliber.

The Dodgers will simply have to find another way.

That has become the unofficial requirement of this team.

On Friday, they found one way to win.

Yamamoto kept them in the game. Muncy and Betts provided the early offense. The bullpen survived another late-inning challenge. Edman finished the job.

Then the Dodgers learned they had lost Pages.

It was, in other words, a very Dodgers kind of night.

The victory moves them to 8-3 over their last 11 games and gives them another opportunity Saturday to continue building momentum. Tarik Skubal gets the start against Pittsburgh, with Jared Jones going for the Pirates.

For now, the Dodgers can enjoy the victory.

Tomorrow, they'll start figuring out how to live without Pages.

And this season has already taught them, they better get used to figuring things out.