There are only so many branches at the top of Dave Roberts’ trust tree, the term he uses to describe his stable of high-leverage relievers, and one of the few the Dodgers manager has at his disposal snapped in the eighth inning on Thursday.
Daniel Hudson, the 37-year-old right-hander who has pitched well enough to replace the struggling Evan Phillips as the team’s closer in July, was tagged for three runs and three hits in the decisive eighth, turning a one-run Dodgers lead into a 6-4 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers in American Family Field.
“Things just kind of went awry that inning,” Roberts said after the Dodgers’ National League West lead over the idle San Diego Padres and Arizona Diamondbacks fell to two games. “Those things happen, but very uncharacteristic of Huddy.”
Dodgers starter Jack Flaherty recovered from a three-run first inning to blank the Brewers over the next four innings, the Dodgers tied the score with two runs in the second and one in the third, and they took a 4-3 lead on Kiké Hernández’ clutch two-out RBI single in the sixth.
Right-handers Joe Kelly and Phillips would normally have been attractive options in the bottom of the sixth, but Kelly has been tagged for five earned runs and three homers in 3 ⅔ innings of five August games, and Phillips is still rebounding from a brutal July in which he had an 11.74 ERA in 10 games.
With the heart of the Brewers order due up in the sixth and again in the eighth or ninth inning, Roberts planned to deploy his top two relievers, Hudson and hard-throwing right-hander Michael Kopech for those two lanes.
Kopech did the job in the sixth, retiring No. 3 batter Garrett Mitchell on a fly ball to center field, striking out cleanup man William Contreras with a 98-mph fastball and getting Willy Adames to fly out to center, extending his scoreless streak since he was acquired from the Chicago White Sox on July 29 to 7 ⅓ innings in seven games.
Left-hander Alex Vesia escaped a two-on, no-outs jam in the seventh by getting Sal Frelick to pop out to second, Joey Ortiz to fly out to right and striking out Brice Turang with a 94-mph fastball. But the dam broke against Hudson in the eighth.
Jackson Chourio led off with a double to left-center, and Mitchell walked. Contreras hit a potential double-play grounder up the middle that was headed right for second baseman Gavin Lux, but the ball hit Hudson’s glove and caromed to shortstop Miguel Rojas, who had no play.
“I tried to get out of the way, and I just couldn’t do it,” Hudson said of the infield single, which loaded the bases with no outs. “It went between my legs and hit my glove.”
Adames lined an RBI single to left for a 4-4 tie. Hernández made a nice diving stop of Tyler Black’s grounder to his left at third, but his only play was to first, Mitchell scoring for a 5-4 lead. Rhys Hoskins followed with a grounder that caromed off Hudson’s foot to Rojas, who got the out at first while Contreras scored for a 6-4 lead.
“I tried to move out of the way of both of them,” Hudson said of the comebackers. “We actually did [pitchers’ fielding practice] getting out of the way of those balls, and I just wasn’t able to do it. It’s frustrating. But at the end of the day, you still have to execute, and I just wasn’t able to do that.”
Milwaukee closer Devin Williams struck out Mookie Betts and Shohei Ohtani in a one-two-three ninth inning, and the Dodgers and their tattered bullpen headed to the airport for a flight to St. Louis.
The Dodgers bullpen ranks seventh in baseball with a 3.63 ERA, and their relievers have combined to throw 471 innings, the fifth-most in baseball and an average of just under four innings a game.
Key setup man Brusdar Graterol has been limited by shoulder and hamstring injuries to one appearance, Ryan Brasier has missed 3 ½ months because of right-calf strain, and Blake Treinen is out because of left-hip inflammation.
Braiser is expected to be activated this weekend, and Treinen should be back next week, but the bullpen has at times crumbled under the heavy workload.
“It’s tough, especially this time of year–they’ve all been used, and they’re all fatigued,” Roberts said. “Obviously, Kopech has been very good for us, but you gotta throw somebody, and Huddy has been one of our most consistent, if not most consistent, relievers, and he had two days off.
“I’m trying to do the best I can as far as managing workloads, but you have the guys you have, and you try not to overuse them or tax them. When you’re winning, that’s a good thing, and you’re going to your leverage guys.”
It would help if the starters went deeper in games, but the rotation has been decimated by injuries, and their reliable pitchers sometimes come up short, like Flaherty did during a five-inning, three-run, four-hit, seven-strikeout start on Thursday.
The right-hander did well to retire 12 of 13 batters from the first through fifth innings, but he could have gone longer had he not needed 26 pitches to complete a first inning in which he gave up a two-run homer to Chourio and a solo shot to Contreras.
“It was good to bounce back after the first, but I still want to go deeper,” Flaherty said. “I put a lot of stress on the bullpen. Those guys have been nails, but you want to get deeper in the game.”