Clayton Keshaw deserves all the flowers that MLB fans and, especially, Los Angeles Dodgers fans send his way. Kershaw, a three-time National League Cy Young Award winner and World Series champion, made his final regular season start in a Dodgers uniform on Friday night, leaving after 4 1/3 innings against the San Francisco Giants.
Although the Giants led 2-1 at the time, that didn't matter too much for most of the fans in attendance. Kershaw's wife and kids were in the stands as their husband and father took the Dodger Stadium mound.
Before the first pitch, Kershaw and catcher Max Muncy went out on the field but Kershaw's teammates held back a bit. Once Kershaw saw that they were doing it, he immediately waved his right glove hand toward them and urging them to get on the field.
The players, though, allowed Kershaw to have a standing ovation.
The Giants-Dodgers game was only available on Apple TV, which kept the game from getting a lot of attention nationwide. It would have been nice if MLB Network could have picked it up, but it didn't happen and MLB fans from around the nation were denied a chance to see a future Hall of Famer take the mound for a final regular season start.
Kershaw gave up a leadoff home run to San Francisco's Helio Ramos in the top of the first inning, putting the Giants up 1-0 early. But Miguel Rojas answered with a solo homer in the bottom of the second, tying things up at 1-1.
In the top of the third, Matt Chapman doubled with one out for San Francisco. Wilmer Flores followed with an RBI single, putting the Giants up 2-1.
In the top of the fifth, Kershaw struck out Rafael Devers. As he did, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts waved to the home plate umpire to signal that he was going to make a pitching change. Kershaw's Dodger teammates either raised their gloves in the air clapping or made their way to the mound. They all wanted to let Kershaw know how much he meant to them all.
Dodger Stadium came alive, too, with everyone standing up. Edgardo Henriquez came in to get the last two outs in the fifth, making it a 2-1 game at that time. In the bottom of the fifth, though, the Dodgers scored four runs to take a 5-2 lead.
But the night belonged to Kershaw, who gave up four hits, two earned runs, walked three and struck out six. Out of 91 total pitches, Kershaw threw 56 strikes and he had his 12-to-6 curveball working as well.
Entering Friday night's game, Kershaw had a career 222-96 record out of 449 career starts. He had 3,309 career strikeouts, too, and a career ERA of 2.54. Kershaw was part of the 2020 World Series-winning Dodgers team that beat the Tampa Bay Rays 4-2. He was out last season when the Dodgers beat the New York Yankees for the 2024 World Series title.
Kershaw will end his 18-year MLB career with some postseason play, too. While his final regular season start is one that Dodgers fans will remember for a long time to come, he's still going to probably get another start. Sure, it will be in the latter parts of the regular season, but that's not what those wearing Dodger Blue were concerned about on Friday night.
It looks like Kershaw will be part of the Dodgers postseason roster as they earned a spot in the National League playoffs with the Philadelphia Phillies beating the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday night.
On Friday night, it was a time to say thank you and pay homage to a guy that will have his name mentioned among other legendary Dodgers pitchers like Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale and Orel Hershiser.
Well done, Clayton.