Dodgers manufacture – Down to the ninth with Mason Miller on the mound, the Dodgers turned chaos into a 5-4 win in San Diego. Alex Call slid home on Andy Pages’ sacrifice fly after a pickoff throw slipped past Ty France, and Freddie Freeman’s two homers—including the key tying shot
SAN DIEGO — The Dodgers had the game teetering in the ninth, and Mason Miller was supposed to be the final stop. Instead, a pickoff attempt slipped past Ty France, and Alex Call found his way all the way around.
It started when Andy Pages delivered a sacrifice fly in the ninth, with Call bringing the tiebreaking run home to cap a late Los Angeles push. The Dodgers then survived the final frame for a 5-4 victory over the San Diego Padres on Tuesday night.
Freddie Freeman set the tone long before the bullpen drama. He launched two home runs for Los Angeles. and the second one mattered most: after the Padres struck early with Manny Machado and Miguel Andujar hitting two-run homers. Freeman answered by tying the score with a solo shot off Jeremiah Estrada in the sixth.
In the ninth, Max Muncy worked a walk after successfully challenging a called third strike to draw first on one out. Miller caught pinch-runner Call taking off for second, but his pickoff throw got past first baseman Ty France. Call raced to third, and that miscue became the doorway for the finish.
Pages stayed patient at the plate, fouling off four two-strike pitches before driving a fly to Fernando Tatis Jr. in right. Sung-mun Song relayed the throw home, and Call barely got under the tag—enough to put Los Angeles in front.
Miller entered with a reputation that carried fear. The Padres closer had held opponents scoreless in 20 of his first 21 appearances this season. and the game looked like it was heading toward one more quiet outing. But the Dodgers manufactured pressure, then cashed it in when a routine play turned into a costly slip.
For San Diego, the loss snapped a four-game winning streak that had stretched back to their 1-0 win Monday in the Southern California rivals’ first series of the season.
Tanner Scott, listed as 1-1, finished the middle of the bullpen stretch by getting four outs in relief. Will Klein handled the 1-2-3 ninth for the Dodgers and earned his first career save.
On the pitching side, Griffin Canning worked five innings for the Padres, allowing four hits and striking out five before leaving with a lead. Emmet Sheehan managed just four innings for Los Angeles, yielding four runs on five hits.
The game’s momentum swung early. Shohei Ohtani led off with a double, then scored two batters later when Freeman homered. Teoscar Hernández doubled and scored on Ohtani’s groundout in the fifth. Still, the Padres held their ground long enough to make Freeman’s sixth-inning shot the bridge back.
Before Tuesday’s first pitch, the Dodgers’ manager, Dave Roberts, said Freeman was feeling better after being under the weather in recent days. Freeman responded by ending a 4-for-29 slump with his first multi-homer game of the season. Los Angeles improved to winning six of seven.
Ohtani—now listed at 3-2 with a 0.82 ERA—will make the eighth start of the season in Wednesday’s series finale. Randy Vásquez goes for the Padres.
New Padres owners José E. Feliciano and Kwanza Jones attended the game, watching a night where the closers’ edge didn’t hold—until the Dodgers made sure it wouldn’t.
Los Angeles Dodgers San Diego Padres Mason Miller Freddie Freeman Alex Call Andy Pages Shohei Ohtani Manny Machado Miguel Andujar Tanner Scott Will Klein Griffin Canning