The Dodgers<\/a>, with a short bullpen after playing extra innings twice in four games, needed Lauer to pitch deep into the game.<\/p>\nThat plan seemed to be in jeopardy as he labored through the first three innings, his pitch count climbing to 64. But the next three, he only gave up just one walk. <\/p>\n
\u201cWasn\u2019t getting a ton of swing out of zone,\u201d Lauer said. \u201cSo mentally I just had to lock in a little bit more in-zone, make sure I was throwing quality pitches in zone, and not try to be so fine. Give myself more plate to work with and try to get some quick soft contact.\u201d<\/p>\n
By the time he exited with one out in the seventh, he\u2019d thrown 112 pitches, the most he\u2019d thrown in a game since September 2024 (114 in 6 \u2154 innings against the Mets) and just three shy of his career high (8 \u2154 innings against the Dodgers in 2018).<\/p>\n
\u201cEric\u2019s a smart player, been around,\u201d manager Dave Roberts said. \u201cAnd I say smart in the sense of understanding where our bullpen was at, and we had essentially everybody down. \u2026 It didn\u2019t look great early as far as pitch efficiency, but he just recalibrated and kind of righted the ship, and it was really good.\u201d<\/p>\n
Right-hander Landon Knack finished the game and got his first save of the season. <\/p>\n
Home runs from Mookie Betts, Shohei Ohtani and Hunter Feduccia provided all the offense the Dodgers needed to secure the victory. <\/p>\n
Lauer, as a pitcher the Dodgers acquired in May to help them weather injuries, has pitched through uncertainty about his future with the team all year. He acknowledged as much as the trade deadline neared. <\/p>\n
Still, he\u2019s remained, through the trade deadline and IL activations, and steadied the rotation in the process. <\/p>\n
Lauer has given up three or fewer runs in all but one of his 11 outings for the Dodgers And the Dodgers have won every game he\u2019s pitched other than that rare clunker (four innings, six runs, 11 hits) against the Cubs at Wrigley Field last week.<\/p>\n
The Dodgers rotation, however, will continue to evolve down the stretch. <\/p>\n
In the coming weeks, the Dodgers probably have to clear room for right-hander Tyler Glasnow\u2019s (back) return from the IL. He\u2019s set to make his third minor-league rehab start later in the week.<\/p>\n
And Ohtani, who has been hitting but not pitching for over a month, has progressed to long toss, although Roberts said he\u2019s not sure when he\u2019ll move to throwing bullpens. <\/p>\n
The Dodgers\u2019 rotation is steadily evolving into its final playoff form. Yoshinobu Yamamoto has been a steady presence at the top all season. Then they added left-hander Tarik Skubal before the trade deadline. And fellow two-time Cy Young winner Blake Snell returned from the injured list to throw six innings of one-run ball Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Right-hander Tyler Glasnow (back) is set to make his third minor-league rehab start later in the week. And Ohtani has progressed to long toss, although manager Dave Roberts said he\u2019s not sure when he\u2019ll move to throwing bullpens.<\/p>\n
The Dodgers still, however, have rotation questions to answer come October. Though they probably will have only four starting spots to fill in the postseason \u2014 and Yamamoto, Skubal, Snell and Glasnow can be penciled in when healthy \u2014 Ohtani\u2019s build-up adds an interesting wrinkle.<\/p>\n
If he runs out of time to build up to a full starter\u2019s workload, will the Dodgers use him as an opener in the postseason? And if so, who will follow him?<\/p>\n
And how do the rest of the Dodgers\u2019 starters \u2014 Roki Sasaki, who has put together an impressive last month, left-hander Justin Wrobleski, a 2026 All-Star who has gone through a recent rough patch, and Lauer, who turned around his season with a change in scenery \u2014 fit into their plans?<\/p>\n
In the coming weeks, the Dodgers will have to clear room for Glasnow\u2019s return from the IL. If they don\u2019t move a starter to the bullpen, or decide Wrobleski could use some time to work through the issues that have sprung up in his last three starts, Lauer\u2019s lack of minor-league options could make him a DFA candidate.<\/p>\n
If Lauer eventually does end up as the odd man out in a roster crunch, he\u2019s done plenty in 11 appearances with the Dodgers to prove he can be an asset to a contending team looking to reinforce its pitching staff. So, he\u2019d draw attention from other teams on the waiver wire or as a free agent.<\/p>\n
But he\u2019s appeared to be on the bubble before. And he\u2019s still here, providing consistency every week.<\/p>\n
Freeman exits<\/p>\n
Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman fell down the visiting dugout stairs<\/a> while chasing a foul ball in the eighth inning. He remained in the game for the top of the eighth, but Tommy Edman hit for him in the bottom of the eighth and he was replaced in the ninth at first base by Kik\u00e9 Hern\u00e1ndez.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dodgers left-hander Eric Lauer adjusted his cap and glanced into the stands as he walked off the field…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":431601,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[426,121340,141915,423,108543,4468,48,52,51,133821,47,50,49,15680,2668,422,171490,427,315,42202,429],"class_list":["post-431600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-dodgers","tag-eric-lauer","tag-full-starter","tag-game","tag-glasnow","tag-inning","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-lauer","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-royals","tag-run","tag-shohei-ohtani","tag-short-bullpen","tag-team","tag-time","tag-value","tag-yoshinobu-yamamoto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431600","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=431600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431600\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/431601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=431600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=431600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=431600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}