Six Straight: Dodgers' Rotation Is Heating Up At The Right Time

The temperature on the field at Dodger Stadium on Sunday afternoon was touching the high 90s. Blake Snell was even hotter.

After plunking the first batter he faced, Snell settled into a performance that had the hapless Pittsburgh Pirates looking for some shade. Over six innings, Snell allowed two hits and no runs while striking out six. An infield single in the first inning and a liner to left in the second were all the Pirates could muster. After that, Snell was knocking them down and taking names later.

In other words, it was a darn impressive performance.

Riding Blake's coattails, the Dodgers' bullpen came in and gave up nary a hit for the remainder of the game. It was a fitting way to close out the short homestand before embarking on a road trip that will include Atlanta and Detroit.

The 4-0 victory over Pittsburgh capped back-to-back sweeps for the Dodgers, who suddenly have a six-game winning streak and some significant pieces of the puzzle starting to show up just in time for the home stretch.

Over the weekend sweep, the Dodgers' starting pitchers were Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tarik Skubal and Blake Snell. That is a formidable crew when you consider the playoff rotation and the fact that Tyler Glasnow and Shohei Ohtani have yet to be added to the equation.

Good luck drawing up a game plan against that.

Roberts certainly understands what it could mean.

"We are pitching well. Starting pitching has been fantastic," Roberts said. "It's good to see Blake follow up Skubal's and Yamamoto's outing and just getting us into the game with a chance to win. The bullpen is in a good spot. Henriquez has really been throwing the baseball well, Brock's been great. So all around, good outing."

It was also important that Snell gave the bullpen some length on a hot afternoon.

"It was hot today, so it's just good to see Blake be efficient," Roberts said.

Efficient is one word for it. Snell was also rather dominant.

And yet, if you had walked into his postgame interview expecting the Dodgers' left-hander to spend a few minutes admiring his work, you would have been disappointed.

Snell wasn't thrilled.

"I got to be better," he said. "Get more first-pitch strikes, land the off-speed. Seeing their game plan against me, I should have adjusted quicker. I got a lot to work on still."

Then came the part that said more about Snell than the final line on the scoreboard.

"There were a couple innings there where I get two quick outs, then full-count walk, full-count walk. That's not acceptable. Especially since I feel good and know I can command the ball. Honestly, it's lazy. It's me trying to get strikeouts instead of trying to go seven, eight or nine. I definitely got to clean that up."

Six scoreless innings, two hits and six strikeouts.

Not acceptable.

That is a fairly demanding internal grading system.

But it also explains why Snell's presence in this rotation could become increasingly important as the Dodgers move toward October. He wasn't interested in celebrating the fact that he had shut down Pittsburgh. He was already looking at what needed to be fixed before his next outing.

There is another reason for that urgency.

Snell knows what is coming.

The Dodgers' rotation is beginning to look crowded in a way that most teams would consider a luxury.

Yamamoto followed by Skubal followed by Snell over the weekend produced 19 innings, five earned runs and 26 strikeouts. Add Glasnow when healthy. Add Ohtani if his pitching progression continues. Add Roki Sasaki to the conversation.

Suddenly, there are some very good pitchers competing for postseason innings.

"It's going to be a lot of good competition between the starting rotation, and I'm really excited about it," Snell said. "I'm grateful we are on the same team. There is a lot to learn."

The Dodgers didn't need to reach back very far offensively Sunday.

For the second straight game, the bottom of the order provided some much-needed assistance. Alek Thomas and Hunter Feduccia, filling in for injured All-Stars Andy Pages and Will Smith, delivered consecutive RBI singles in the fourth inning.

That turned what had been shaping up as another one-run Dodgers game into something resembling a leisurely Sunday afternoon.

Thomas has quickly made himself useful since arriving to replace Pages, and his contributions over the weekend have been particularly encouraging considering the concern about losing some offensive production along with Pages' defense.

"Definitely feels good," Thomas said. "Coming here, I played against the Dodgers my whole career, grew up not really liking the team, whatever. And coming over here, it feels good to be on a side that wins a lot and has fun."

That last part certainly hasn't been lost on Kyle Tucker.

Tucker entered the weekend hitting .189 at Dodger Stadium and had gone 0 for 19 during his last homestand. The frustration had begun to spill over into his defense when he dropped a routine foul ball Friday night in front of a crowd whose patience had been tested about as thoroughly as it could be.

Then something changed.

Dodgers fans began cheering Tucker loudly every time he came to the plate, hoping to lift him out of the slump. It was reminiscent of the standing ovations Philadelphia Phillies fans gave Trea Turner during his struggles three years ago.

Whether the fans deserve credit is debatable.

The timing is not.

Tucker delivered the winning hit Saturday with a two-run single and added another hit and a run Sunday.

"I feel good this weekend, just the contribution in this game," Tucker said. "It was great, we got a sweep so can't complain too much about that."

He added that he has been putting together better at-bats and hitting balls hard even when they haven't found open space.

"Just trying to put together good at-bats, get guys over, man."

The Dodgers will gladly take more of that.

They will also gladly take what they are getting from their pitching.

Six straight wins have followed the turbulence of the previous weeks, and back-to-back sweeps have given the Dodgers a much different feel heading into the final stretch of the season.

Nobody should confuse two sweeps of Colorado and Pittsburgh with a solved baseball team. The schedule gets considerably more serious from here.

But the Dodgers are beginning to resemble the team they expected to be when the season began.

The starting pitching is becoming a strength rather than a question. The bullpen is settling into a more reliable rhythm. Players such as Thomas and Feduccia are stepping in after injuries to established players. Tucker is beginning to show signs of life.

And then there is Ohtani.

Ohtani threw 30 pitches in a live batting-practice session Saturday at Dodger Stadium, his first time facing hitters since his July 3 start. Roberts said the session puts Ohtani in position to return to the mound soon.

He is scheduled to throw a bullpen session during the upcoming series in Atlanta, after which the Dodgers will decide whether he is ready to rejoin the rotation or needs another live batting-practice session.

Roberts said there is a possibility Ohtani could return as soon as the first week of September.

Last season, when Ohtani was returning from his second Tommy John surgery, the Dodgers eased him into pitching with one inning at a time. This time, Roberts indicated the plan could be more aggressive.

"I would say it'd be a little bit more aggressive," Roberts said.

Asked whether Ohtani could theoretically build up to five innings by the end of the season, Roberts answered:

"In theory, yes."

That is a sentence that should make opposing National League lineups sleep particularly well.

For now, the Dodgers will settle for what they have.

Yamamoto gave them six-plus strong innings Friday. Skubal followed with seven Saturday. Snell delivered six scoreless Sunday.

The bullpen didn't allow a hit Sunday.

The offense did enough.

The Dodgers swept another series.

And after spending much of the summer looking like a team searching for answers, they are suddenly putting some of those answers on the field at the same time.

Six straight wins is not a championship.

Neither is a deep rotation on paper.

But for a team that has been waiting for the pieces to come together, the timing is getting interesting.

The Dodgers now leave Los Angeles for Atlanta and Detroit.

They do so with a six-game winning streak, a rotation that is beginning to look formidable and an injured list that, for once, isn't the only thing getting attention.

The heat is still on. This time, the Dodgers appear to be bringing some of it with them.