LOS ANGELES — Mike Bolsinger retired his final 23 batters after giving up a leadoff single in the first inning and Joc Pederson homered, leading the Los Angeles Dodgers to a 2-0 victory over the punchless San Diego Padres on Saturday night.
Bolsinger (3-0) struck out eight and walked none through eight innings. Kenley Jansen pitched a perfect ninth for his third save in three attempts since opening the season on the disabled list.
Yangervis Solarte opened the game with a clean hit to right-centre field, but was quickly erased on a double-play grounder by Cory Spangenberg, and the Padres didn’t get another baserunner.
San Diego left fielder Justin Upton was ejected by plate umpire Clint Fagan in the eighth, one batter after he was called out on strikes. The next batter Will Venable, tried to bunt his way on and Bolsinger made a diving trap on the ball before tossing to first base for the out.
Ian Kennedy (2-4) lost his third straight start, allowing two runs and six hits in six innings with six strikeouts and no walks.
The right-hander is 0-7 with a 5.48 ERA in his last 11 starts against the Dodgers. His other outing against them this season was on April 25, when he gave up eight runs and three homers through 4 1/3 innings in his first start off the disabled list.
One night after Pederson’s go-ahead solo homer in the eighth inning off Joaquin Benoit helped the Dodgers win the series opener 2-1, he led off the bottom of the first inning with his team-high 12th of the season. It was the third leadoff homer for the 23-year-old centre fielder, tying Johnny Frederick of the 1929 Dodgers for the most in franchise history by a rookie.
Pederson, who has nine homers and 28 strikeouts in 21 games since he was moved from eighth in the batting order to first on April 29, had a chance to do some more damage in the second inning. However, Kennedy had him badly fooled on a 1-2 breaking ball and he stranded two runners in scoring position.
The Dodgers, who totalled just four runs over their previous six games and were completely blanked in a three-game series at San Francisco, got their second run against Kennedy when Adrian Gonzalez singled with two out in the sixth and came all the way around on Justin Turner’s double to left-centre.
The Padres have scored only three runs during their four-game losing streak and are 0-22 this season when trailing after eight innings.
Padres third baseman Will Middlebrooks started at shortstop for the first time in eight seasons of professional ball and had only one ball hit to him — a grounder by Turner. He played shortstop regularly in high school, but was converted to third base by the Red Sox after they drafted him in 2007. Middlebrooks played two-thirds of an inning at short on May 10, but didn’t have a ball hit to him.
COMINGS AND GOINGS:
Padres: Claimed LHP Eury De La Rosa off waivers him from the Dodgers and optioned him to Triple-A El Paso, four days after Los Angeles designated him for assignment. RHP Josh Johnson, recovering from Tommy John surgery, was moved from the 15-day disabled list to the 60-day DL to make room for De La Rosa on the 40-man roster.
TRAINER’S ROOM
Dodgers: Placed C Yasmani Grandal on the seven-day concussion disabled list by the Los Angeles Dodgers and promoted Austin Barnes from Triple-A Oklahoma City to serve as A.J. Ellis’ backup. Grandal, who came to the Dodgers from San Diego in the Matt Kemp trade on Dec. 18, was struck on the right side of the head by the follow-through of Solarte’s swing in the third inning of Friday’s game and took a foul tip off the mask off Kemp’s bat in the fourth.
UP NEXT
Padres: RHP James Shields (5-0) will try to start a season with six straight winning decisions for the second time in his 10-year career. He was 6-0 with a 3.04 ERA over his first 13 starts with Tampa Bay in 2007, his second season in the big leagues.
Dodgers: RHP Carlos Frias (3-1) has a 2.82 ERA in four starts this season, and one of his victories came in a relief role.
