The Los Angeles Dodgers get off on the right foot, beating the Kansas City Royals in Tarik Skubal's home debut.
There aren’t many nights during a baseball season in the crack of August that could move MLB fanfare to a complete stop.
On Monday, that was the case, as back-to-back Cy Young Award winner Tarik Skubal made his home debut at Chavez Ravine for the Los Angeles Dodgers. Though it wasn't a lights-out performance from Skubal, the Dodgers' 6-5 series-opening win against the Kansas City Royals was the biggest outlier.
Coming off an abysmal road trip in which Los Angeles overcame an eight-game losing streak and went 1-5 overall, a victory to kick off a lengthy homestand was a breath of fresh air.
"I thought I competed well and gave our team a chance to win," Skubal said on his home opener performance via SportsNetLA. "Our offense picked me up big time, defense picked me up big time, and the bullpen was outstanding tonight. All in all, a good team win, especially when I don’t feel like I performed up to my standard."
The Royals tagged Skubal for three earned runs across five innings on four hits. In his previous two starts against Kansas City, the southpaw allowed just one earned run in 14.1 innings and struck out 16.
Kansas City rung up Skubal's pitch count high through the first three innings, but breezed through his last two innings of work.
Offensively, the Dodgers bats started off cold, which was reminiscent of games prior.
Los Angeles scored two early runs in the third inning, brought to you by an RBI double from Shohei Ohtani and an RBI single from Freddie Freeman. That kept them within one run of the Royals as they scored the three aforementioned runs, all from Jac Caglianone.
As it was written, Max Muncy — who was celebrating a bobblehead night — found himself with the bases loaded and two outs in the bottom of the sixth.
Muncy took John Schreiber's 1-2 inside fastball down the right field line for a bases-clearing triple.
The Dodgers' 5-3 lead was short-lived.
Kansas City center fielder Kyle Isbel took Jack Dryer's first-pitch slider deep for a two-run shot to tie the game.
Freeman and the Dodgers responded in the bottom half of the seventh with a go-ahead RBI single for a 6-5 lead.
Edwin Díaz was tasked with securing the final three outs a high-leverage spot in the ninth.
Despite the three blown saves this year, Díaz buckled down and earned a 1-2-3 frame to secure the series-opening win.
With the win, the Dodgers improve to 71-48 on the season.
Blake Snell, who will be activated from the Injured List on Tuesday, takes the mound in hopes of securing the first series win of the month of August.
