Spring Training Mistakes, October Stakes

The Dodgers and Braves played a game that somehow managed to be part Cactus League experiment, part October chess match — and ended with a guy who hadn't had a hit since June sending Atlanta home happy.

There are baseball games that make perfect sense. There are baseball games that require a little explanation. And then there are games like Wednesday night's Dodgers-Braves affair, which seemed to have been assembled by someone who couldn't decide whether it was March or October.

It was part spring training, part playoff baseball and, by the time it ended, part cruel practical joke.

The Braves beat the Dodgers 6-5 on Ha-Seong Kim's two-out walk-off single in the ninth inning, leaving Los Angeles with a second consecutive loss in a series that suddenly feels considerably more important than anyone would prefer in August.

The Dodgers had 11 men left on base, matching Tuesday night's Cactus League-like level of offensive inefficiency. Atlanta managed to outdo them, stranding 13. The Dodgers left the bases loaded twice late in the game. Atlanta did the same in the eighth, when Mauricio Dubón grounded into a double play.

Then there was Teoscar Hernández in left field, providing perhaps the night's most convincing evidence that, yes, this really was some sort of bizarre hybrid baseball game.

With Atlanta already threatening in the fourth, Drake Baldwin lifted a ball toward left. Hernández got underneath it, only to overrun the ball as it dropped behind him. What should have been a catch became a two-run double, allowing both runners to score and turning a 3-2 Dodgers lead into a 4-3 Atlanta advantage.

It was not one of those balls that leaves everybody shrugging and saying, Well, those things happen.

No. This was one of those balls where the announcers from Georgia to Los Angeles seemed to arrive at the same conclusion simultaneously:

There is no way he should have missed that ball.

Dave Roberts said Hernández simply overran it. And while Hernández would later make a difficult catch at the wall, the damage had already been done.

Those are the mistakes that might get filed away in March under That's what spring training is for.

In late August, with the Dodgers and Braves fighting for the No. 2 position in the National League and trying to avoid the chaos of the three-game wild-card round, there isn't quite as much room for the spring-training excuse.

And yet, despite all the stranded runners, defensive miscues and bullpen drama, there was some very serious baseball being played underneath the circus.

That's what made the whole thing so strange.

The Dodgers got terrific offensive performances from Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman and Tommy Edman, with Edman providing the biggest blow of the early going when his two-run homer in the third inning put Los Angeles ahead 3-1. Edman later contributed another RBI when he drew a bases-loaded walk in the seventh, part of a two-run inning that pulled the Dodgers even at 5.

For Atlanta, Drake Baldwin collected three hits and drove in two with the fourth-inning double, while Sean Murphy hit his first home run of the season. Matt Olson added his 37th.

There was enough offense to make the scoreboard interesting and enough baserunners to make everybody uncomfortable.

There was also enough strategy to make it clear nobody was treating this like March.

Murphy, despite having earlier hit a home run and reaching first base with an infield single, was immediately replaced by pinch-runner Luke Hicklen.

That, right there, was playoff baseball.

The Braves weren't saving anybody for tomorrow. They were trying to win tonight.

The Dodgers were doing the same, although their night took an unexpected turn in the fourth inning when Roki Sasaki's right middle finger apparently decided it had seen enough.

Sasaki had not felt anything before facing the hitter, but as he explained afterward, his skin simply ripped open. After that, things got progressively worse.

"When I was facing the hitters in the 4th inning, I actually didn't feel anything beforehand, my skin just ripped off and after that it just got worse."

By the time Sasaki left with one out in the fourth, his finger was bleeding badly enough that the rosin bag was beginning to look less like a piece of baseball equipment and more like a surgical dressing.

He allowed four runs on six hits.

Then came the baseball version of cleaning up somebody else's mess.

Edgardo Henriquez inherited multiple runners and, with Baldwin's ball getting past Hernández, watched both of them score. The runs were charged to Sasaki, turning what had been a relatively manageable outing into a four-run line in just 3⅓ innings.

The Dodgers eventually fought their way back.

In the seventh, Ohtani doubled to start the inning, Freddie Freeman singled and Mookie Betts followed with another base hit to bring Los Angeles within one. Max Muncy then walked, loading the bases with nobody out.

Didier Fuentes entered and immediately walked in the tying run.

Then, somehow, he escaped.

Kyle Tucker lined out. Alek Thomas grounded into a double play.

Five-five.

And because neither team apparently had any interest in making this easy, both clubs found another way to leave runners standing around.

The Braves loaded the bases in the eighth with nobody out after Baldwin's second double of the night. Los Angeles even intentionally walked Matt Olson to load the bases.

Then Mauricio Dubón grounded into a 6-4-3 double play.

No run.

The Dodgers came to the plate and did their own impression of a team allergic to finishing innings.

Teoscar Hernández reached with an infield single, and after a sacrifice bunt and a groundout, Atlanta intentionally walked Freeman and then put Mookie Betts on as well, loading the bases.

Muncy and Fuentes proceeded to have themselves a nine-pitch argument.

Fuentes won.

Five-five.

By the ninth, the score was tied and the Dodgers had one obvious mission: get the game to extra innings.

So Tanner Scott was sent out to make that happen.

He got the first two outs.

Then Lane Thomas doubled.

Suddenly, this was no longer a routine ninth inning. It was one of those innings where everybody in the building knows exactly what is coming next, even if nobody wants to say it out loud.

The Dodgers intentionally walked Austin Riley, putting runners at first and second and bringing up Ha-Seong Kim. (Not to be confused with Hyeseong Kim, the Dodgers' own Korean infielder.)

And if the Dodgers had been writing the script themselves, they probably would have left that particular character out.

Kim entered the at-bat having not collected a hit since June 3. He had been struggling badly enough that his appearance in the ninth felt less like the arrival of an offensive savior and more like an opportunity the Dodgers had been handed on a silver platter.

Scott worked him to a full count.

Kim fouled off pitches.

Then, on the eighth pitch, Scott threw him a 97 mph four-seam fastball.

Kim sent it into left-center field.

Thomas scored.

Game over.

There are certain moments when baseball stops trying to make sense and simply reminds everybody that it doesn't have to.

Ha-Seong Kim hadn't had a hit since June 3.

Now he had the biggest hit of the night.

Scott, meanwhile, had taken the loss for the second consecutive night.

That is the sort of sequence that makes postgame radio particularly dangerous for one's blood pressure.

Scott's back-to-back losses will undoubtedly get plenty of attention, especially with Edwin Díaz nearing his return. But Dodgers fans looking at Díaz as the immediate answer to every bullpen question might want to hold the parade for a moment. Díaz has reportedly been told that he will not return to the closer role.

Which means Timmy Trumpet may soon find himself relegated to second fiddle.

The Dodgers and Braves are now separated by the slimmest of margins for the coveted No. 2 position in the National League.

And that is where the strange hybrid nature of this game becomes more than a cute description.

There is still plenty of baseball left. Players are being evaluated. Pitchers are returning, leaving, adjusting and occasionally bleeding. Lineups are being shuffled. Bullpens are being tested. Guys are getting pinch-runner treatment in August that ordinarily might seem premature.

But the reason everyone is doing it is increasingly October.

The No. 2 seed isn't merely a number. It means avoiding the best-of-three wild-card round, where three games can turn a 162-game season into a very expensive vacation.

So Wednesday night was played with one foot in the Cactus League and the other planted firmly in October.

The Dodgers created traffic.

The Braves finished the inning.

And when it mattered most, the guy who hadn't had a hit since June 3 finished the game.

Sometimes baseball doesn't need an explanation.

Sometimes it just needs a scoreboard.

Braves 6, Dodgers 5.

And somewhere between spring training and October, the Dodgers found out that the mistakes that seem harmless in March can look awfully expensive in August.