The Dodgers broke open a scoreless game with ten runs in the final four frames. Ted Lilly pitched six innings and kept the Pirates in check for the win.
Through five innings Kevin Correia and Lilly matched each other. Combine the two offenses only sent one man past first base. That all changed in the sixth. With two outs Jamey Carroll and Aaron Miles both reached on a single. Andre Ethier singled home Carroll. Matt Kemp delivered the big blow – a three run bomb to put LA up 4-0.
The Pirates appeared to be getting to lilly in their half of the sixth. Andrew McCutchen led off with a homer. Jose Tabata doubled and moved over on a ground ball before scoring on a sac fly from Neil Walker.
The Dodgers got one of those runs back in the seventh. Rod Barajas doubled and then scored when Jerry Sands grounder bounced off Correia. Steve Pearce made an errant toss trying to get Sands, allowing Barajas to score. Correia exited in favor of Daniel Moskos and he got out of the jam without more damage done.
Los Angeles put the game away in the eighth. Michael Crotta relieved Moskos and gave up three straight singles to start the inning. The third – off the bat of Juan Uribe – scored one run. A walk to James Loney loaded the bases and signaled the end for Crotta. Chris Resop entered and had little success. He gave up consecutive bases loaded walks and then allowed a two run single to Miles to put the Dodgers in a commanding 9-3 lead.
Correia suffered the loss. He surrendered ten hits in 6-1/3 innings. He was charged with five runs (four earned) and no walks. Lilly went six innings and gave up two runs. He gave up four hits and struck out four.
The Good
McCutchen homered off Lance Cormier in the eighth to give him a pair of solo homers on the game.
The Bad
Crotta was lit for four runs while not retiring anyone.
The offense sputtered again, collecting just seven hits and one walk.
The Rest
This was the third multi-homer game for McCutchen in his career. His last two homer game was 4/28/10 against Milwaukee.
Lilly is now 6-4 against Pittsburgh in his career. The current crop of Pirates came into the contest with a collective .250 batting average against Lilly.
Correia is now 5-4 against the Dodgers. This was his 25th career appearance and 11th start against the Flatbush Refugees.
This was the 48th career three hit game for Jamey Carroll and his sixth in 2011. I was listening to this game on XM on my drive home. The announcers stated that Carroll leads all Major League shortstops in OBP going back to the start of 2010. I thought, ‘Huh? No way. Can’t be. What about Tulo? What about Hanley Ramirez.’ So, I dug it up on www.baseball-reference.com and sure enough, Carroll is in the lead. I searched based on at least 150 at bats and 25% of games played at shortstop. In case anyone is wondering – avert your eyes unless you enjoy reading painful things – Ronny Cedeno ranks 44th on that list.
