{"id":427914,"date":"2026-08-09T07:06:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-09T07:06:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/427914\/"},"modified":"2026-08-09T07:06:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-09T07:06:15","slug":"dodgers-end-7-game-losing-streak-despite-edwin-diaz-implosion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/427914\/","title":{"rendered":"Dodgers end 7-game losing streak despite Edwin D\u00edaz implosion"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

PHOENIX\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Dodgers<\/a> reliever Jack Dreyer<\/a> let loose a shout, balling his hands into fists as he released the tension of the last several minutes \u2014 or, from a team perspective, over a week. <\/p>\n

The Dodgers had just pulled off a 2-1 win<\/a> against the Diamondbacks in the 10th inning, and, mercifully, snapped a seven-game losing streak. It was their longest such streak since July 2025. They haven\u2019t had a losing streak longer than seven games since September 2017 (11).<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that was the most emotion I\u2019ve ever showed,\u201d said Dreyer, who picked up his first save of the season. \u201cIt was nice because I knew I wouldn\u2019t go back out for the next inning. … The game was over. So kind of let the emotions take over for a little bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before this latest streak, the Dodgers had done an admirable job of not piling up losses. They hadn\u2019t lost more than four straight games until this week. But the Dodgers were swept in two straight series, against the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago Cubs heading into the weekend against Arizona (62-56).<\/p>\n

The Dodgers\u2019 National League West lead over the second-place Diamondbacks moved up to 8\u00bd games.<\/p>\n

Many of the Dodgers\u2019 recent problems still flared. The offense is slumping, and the back end of the bullpen has been shaky. But at least the streak was finally over. <\/p>\n

\u201cMan, that was a tough one,\u201d manager Dave Roberts<\/a> said. \u201cWe\u2019ll take it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Dodgers\u2019 offense has been all but silenced in two games against Arizona. A day after Merrill Kelly kept the Dodgers hitless through his first five innings, Arizona starter Brandon Pfaadt gave up only a pair of infield hits to Andy Pages through seven innings.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think each individual, there\u2019s a different component,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cBut I think collectively, we just gotta come together. We\u2019re just better than this. As we always say, it\u2019s not a try league. We gotta get it done. We gotta be better, and again, to score one or two runs to win, it\u2019s just a hard quality of life. I understand hitting is hard. I did it, but we\u2019ve got a lot of talent in the room.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dodgers starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto<\/a> was nearly as effective, holding the Diamondbacks to three hits. But he wasn\u2019t as efficient and exited with two outs in the sixth inning, his pitch count up to 107.<\/p>\n

The game remained scoreless until Kyle Tucker<\/a>, whose bat has been hot this road trip, hit a solo home run to right field off Diamondbacks reliever Jonathan Lo\u00e1isiga in the eighth.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

Teoscar Hern\u00e1ndez<\/a> and Hunter Feduccia<\/a> followed with singles, but both were left stranded when Shohei Ohtani<\/a> and Pages struck out.<\/p>\n

Dodgers reliever Kyle Hurt<\/a> retired the first two batters in the eighth before giving up a single and back-to-back walks to load the bases. Tanner Scott replaced him and got out of the jam by inducing Waldschmidt to fly out.<\/p>\n

In the ninth, D\u00edaz, who gave up a walk-off home run Friday<\/a>, blew it again, but he at least managed to keep the score tied.<\/p>\n

D\u00edaz gave up back-to-back triples to Geraldo Perdomo and Corbin Carroll to tie the score. He retired three of the next four batters, with an intentional walk in between, to send the game into extra innings. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou saw once they scored the run, man on third base, nobody out, you saw the intensity pick up, the stuff picked up,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cThe fastball got better. The slider got better. Even talking to him after the game, that\u2019s how we have to be from the first pitch. That was the first game I saw this year where he had some real intensity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tucker served as the Dodgers\u2019 automatic runner on second base to start the 10th inning, and with two outs, he advanced to third base on a wild pitch, as Feduccia took first on a walk.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

That put runners on the corners for Ohtani. He hit a sharp groundball to the right of Diamondbacks first baseman Tim Tawa, who made a diving stop. But the ball rolled away from him as he went to flip to first, giving Ohtani time to reach first and Tucker time to score the go-ahead run.<\/p>\n

\u201cI guess that was the game right there,\u201d Tucker said. \u201cSo it was a great at-bat out of him and being able to get down the line was huge.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clinging to a narrow lead, the Dodgers turned to Dreyer. He struck out Tawa. And then he got James McCann to hit a soft grounder up the middle, but McCann beat second baseman Tommy Edman\u2019s throw to first by a split second.<\/p>\n

With runners on the corners, Waldschmidt hit a bouncing comebacker that Dreyer snagged and threw to second before Edman quickly threw to Freddie Freeman to end the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt helps when you have some of the best defensive players in the game behind you,\u201d Dreyer said. \u201cI knew that all I needed to do was get the ball to Tommy and he would take care of the rest. I don\u2019t know if I had too much velo on the throw to him, but once it got to him, he made the play. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat was fun to watch.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Dodgers <\/p>\n

Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani hits an RBI single in the 10th inning against the Diamondbacks on Saturday.<\/p>\n

(Rick Scuteri \/ Associated Press)<\/p>\n

Ohtani plays catch<\/p>\n

Fans consolidated in the right field stands as Ohtani warmed up by throwing a weighted plyo ball against the back wall of the visitor\u2019s bullpen and then returned to the outfield to play catch.<\/p>\n

It was the first time Ohtani, who threw on flat ground from about 90 feet, has been spotted playing catch before a game since July 22, when he threw a 31-pitch bullpen in Philadelphia. According to the team, he has been keeping his arm moving with plyo ball drills.<\/p>\n

Ohtani declined to comment through a team representative.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s sort of Shohei and the training staff driving it, more Shohei,\u201d Roberts said of Ohtani\u2019s throwing schedule. \u201cSo I don\u2019t know if he\u2019s going to come back out there [Sunday] and pick up a baseball, or if it\u2019s going to be Monday, but I do think that him getting out there and playing catch is a step in the right direction.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOENIX\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Dodgers reliever Jack Dreyer let loose a shout, balling his hands into fists as he released the tension…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":427915,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[9003,4472,23982,426,170371,423,170373,4468,11443,48,52,51,47,50,49,111740,8654,131141,170372,422,30246],"class_list":["post-427914","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-arizona-diamondbacks","tag-ball","tag-diaz","tag-dodgers","tag-edwin-diaz-implosion","tag-game","tag-infield-hit","tag-inning","tag-kyle-tucker","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-right-field","tag-runner","tag-ryan-waldschmidt","tag-second-baseman-tommy-edman","tag-shohei-ohtani","tag-streak"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=427914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/427915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=427914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=427914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=427914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}