Justin Turner, Dodgers top Giants; move closer to NL West title
By Jake Misener
Justin Turner opened and closed the scoring for the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday night, propelling his team to a 4-2 win over the division rival San Francisco Giants in front of the home faithful at Dodger Stadium, and reducing its magic number to clinch the National League West crown to one.
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The heated rivalry was on full display early on when Giants left-hander Madison Bumgarner hit Yasiel Puig in the foot on a 1-2 slider, prompting the benches and bullpens to clear. The bad blood between the two sides – especially involving the often-controversial outfielder – stems back to May 9, when Puig’s bat flip after homering off Bumgarner angered the left-hander.
That came with the Giants (85-72) already trailing 1-0 after Turner led off the game with a solo blast. Two batters later, with two outs in the inning, Matt Kemp plated both himself and Puig with a two-run blast that put the Dodgers up 3-0 – a lead the club would not relinquish.
After gutting his way through the 36-pitch first inning, Bumgarner (18-10, 2.98 ERA) settled down for the most part, but was still not quite himself, allowing four earned runs on six hits – three of which left the ballpark – in 7 1/3 innings. The southpaw also accounted for the entirety of the San Francisco offense, hitting a two-run home run in the top of the third – his fourth homer of the season.
His counterpart, right-hander Zack Greinke, was lights-out apart from the home run he allowed to Bumgarner, as the right-hander pitched eight innings, scattering six hits and striking out five. Greinke (16-8, 2.74 ERA) has now tied his career-high for wins in a season, and has won his last four decisions. He has also stepped up his game time and time again against the Giants, against whom he is 5-0 this year.
With Bumgarner at 115 pitches with one out in the bottom of the eighth, Turner stepped to the dish again, taking the 0-1 pitch and depositing it into the first row of left-field bleachers – putting Los Angeles (90-68) up 4-2. Kenley Jansen entered in the ninth, closing things out for his league-leading 44th save of the season.
The Dodgers will have a chance to clinch the division title at home Wednesday night against the Giants behind likely NL Cy Young and MVP Clayton Kershaw, who has already notched 20 wins this year, despite missing several starts early in the season with an injury.