Mookie Betts — or, as he’s known around these parts, “Spooky” Betts — returned to the Dodgers’ lineup for the opener of a four-game series against the Milwaukee Brewers on Monday night, refusing to stay with the team at the supposedly haunted Pfister Hotel for the second straight season.
Whether ghosts actually exist in the historic 131-year-old downtown hotel filled with grand marble staircases and gold-leaf frames is open to debate, but Betts wasn’t about to take a chance that they do.
“You don’t want to mess with them,” Betts said. “I’m staying at an [apparition-free] Airbnb again. That part is not gonna change.”
Another thing that hasn’t changed: Betts’ ability to make baseballs disappear.
Playing for the first time in seven weeks and wearing a protective guard on his left hand, Betts deposited a two-run home run over the left-field wall in the third inning for the first runs of an eventual 5-2 win over the Brewers in American Family Field.
Betts also hit a two-out RBI single in the seventh inning for a key insurance run that helped push the Dodgers to their fourth straight win.
Shohei Ohtani followed Kevin Kiermaier’s fifth-inning single with his National League-leading 36th home run, driving a 3-and-0 fastball from Brewers right-hander Freddy Peralta 424 feet to left-center field to give the Dodgers a 4-0 lead.
Clayton Kershaw delivered his best start in four games since his late-July return from shoulder surgery, giving up one earned run and three hits in 5 ⅔ innings, striking out six and walking two for his first win of the season.
Kershaw departed with a runner aboard and two out in the bottom of the sixth, only to have his replacement, Joe Kelly, give up a two-run home run to William Contreras that cut the Dodgers’ lead to 4-2.
Kelly gave up back-to-back singles to Willy Adames and Gary Sanchez before striking out Rhys Hoskins with an 89-mph knuckle-curve to end the inning. The right-hander has been tagged for five earned runs and five hits — three of them homers — in 3 ⅔ innings of his last five games.
The Dodgers got one of those runs back in the top of the seventh when Ohtani walked with two out, stole second — his 33rd stolen base of the season — and scored on Betts’ RBI single to right field for a 5-2 lead.
Dodgers left-hander Alex Vesia struck out the side in the seventh, and right-hander Michael Kopech struck out two of four in a scoreless eighth, Jake Bauers with a 101-mph fastball and Adames with a 98-mph fastball.
Kopech has given up one hit, struck out 10 and walked one in 6 ⅓ innings of six games since being acquired from the Chicago White Sox. Daniel Hudson retired the side in order in the ninth for his ninth save.
Betts had not played since June 16, the day he suffered a left-hand fracture when he was struck by a 98-mph fastball from Kansas City Royals right-hander Dan Altavilla.
Betts spent the first 2 ½ months of the season in the leadoff spot and at shortstop, a position he was thrust into because of Gavin Lux’s throwing woes in early March. Betts, who hadn’t played shortstop regularly since high school, was moved from right field to second base over the winter.
But both Betts and the Dodgers decided last Friday that the team, and the player, would be better off with Betts in right field, the position Betts has played for a decade and won six Gold Glove Awards at.
Betts looked comfortable and confident in the outfield Monday night, quickly gathering Jackson Chourio’s sixth-inning line drive off the wall and firing back to second to hold the Brewers’ left fielder to a single.
“It’s just whatever’s best for the team, man,” Betts said before the game. “I believe I can be a good shortstop, but there’s a couple guys in our clubhouse [Miguel Rojas and Nick Ahmed] who are very, very good at it, so they need to take care of that.”
The Dodgers went 44-29, averaged 4.90 runs a game and hit .255 with a .770 on-base-plus-slugging percentage in their first 73 games with Betts. They went 25-20, averaged 4.98 runs a game and hit .248 with a .757 OPS in 46 games without Betts.
“Being able to pencil his name in the lineup, we certainly got a lot better,” manager Dave Roberts said. “I think we’re kind of getting to the point where we’re putting guys in their respective spots in the order, which adds length and just makes us a better ballclub.”
Betts’ return and position switch had a domino effect on the roster and lineup, with utility man Amed Rosario and right fielder Jason Heyward bearing the brunt of the move.
Rosario, who was batting .305 in 81 games this season, was designated for assignment to clear a roster spot for Betts just two weeks after he was acquired from Tampa Bay to bolster an injury-plagued roster, the Dodgers choosing to keep the right-handed bats of utility man Kiké Hernández and Ahmed over Rosario.
“You’re cutting ties with a really good ballplayer who is versatile, but it shows the talent we have in the room now and that’s potentially coming,” Roberts said, alluding to the expected return of utility man Tommy Edman next week. “I really like Amed a lot. It’s a tough decision. But with our lineup construction, I just didn’t see a lot of runway for him.”
The left-handed-hitting Heyward has started 48 games in right field, batting .204 with five homers and 24 RBIs, but with Gold Glove-caliber defender Kiermaier and Andy Pages platooning in center field and Teoscar Hernández entrenched in left field, Heyward will be reduced to a pinch-hitter with an occasional spot start.
“I talked to Jason a few days ago, and like Rosario, he was a pro,” Roberts said. “Jason just wants to be a part of things and will do anything that’s asked. He understands where we’re at, how this roster is shaping up, the value of Mookie playing right field and what the implications are. I’m going to try to find some at-bats for him.”
Heyward, a 15-year veteran who helped the Chicago Cubs win the 2016 World Series, took the demotion in stride.
“I’ll be ready for whatever it is I can be ready for on a day-to-day basis,” Heyward said. “It’s awesome to get Mookie back in our lineup. He’s a tough guy to miss, so it will be fun to have him back. The name of the game is helping the team win, and I’ll be ready for that.”