Sunday was gut-check time for the Dodgers.
A day where, as a clearly frustrated Dave Roberts put it before the game, the team needed to “not get embarrassed” in the face of a potential three-game sweep by the Arizona Diamondbacks, and play with a level of “pride” that had been missing the previous two nights.
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“Whatever it is, we’ve got to do it right now,” the manager said. “We’ve got to win today. We’ve got to play better baseball. … There’s more in there. There just is.”
Whatever Roberts was looking for, the Dodgers provided just enough Sunday.
Despite blowing a three-run lead that tied the game going into the ninth, the Dodgers prevailed on Will Smith’s pinch-hit, walk-off home run, beating the Diamondbacks 5-4 to move two games up in the National League West standings after the San Diego Padres’ rubber-match loss to the Minnesota Twins earlier in the day.
The win should have been simpler.
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Yoshinobu Yamamoto delivered a seven-inning, one-run gem, tying his career-high with 10 strikeouts while also not allowing a walk. The Dodgers lineup, meanwhile, wore down Arizona starter Brandon Pfaadt, scoring twice in the first and again in the fourth and fifth to chase him from the game early.
Tanner Scott almost wasted those efforts. In the eighth, he gave up a pair of two-out singles before Corbin Carroll took him deep for a tying three-run blast. Scott was booed off the mound, his earned-run average rising to 4.44 in a disastrous debut season in Los Angeles.
Dodgers pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto delivers during the fourth inning Sunday against the Diamondbacks. (Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)
Smith, however, saved the day, coming off the bench and hitting the second pitch he saw into the left-field pavilion to ensure the Dodgers didn’t come out of this weekend empty-handed.
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Of course, any feeling of progress from the Dodgers will remain tempered for now.
Friday and Saturday, after all, produced the kind of maddening performances from the club that have dogged them throughout the second half of the season.
The team looked lifeless at the plate both nights, scoring one run off Arizona’s beleaguered pitching staff in 18 total innings. They committed fundamental miscues on the bases and on defense, lapses Roberts boiled down to a simple lack of focus. And, as has become a recurring theme during their 22-27 rut since the Fourth of July, they once again played down to a level their $400-million roster simply shouldn’t.
Read more: Hernández: Everyone can stop wondering. Mookie Betts isn’t moving back to right field
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“There has to be a point where that has to be sharpened,” Roberts said. “And that’s where, I feel, the time is now.”
Given the roller-coaster nature of the season, it’s impossible to know if — and when — the next drop is coming.
The Dodgers (78-59) have shown flashes of improvement at times in the last two months — like when they swept the Reds to start this homestand, or swept the Padres at the end of the previous one — only to quickly revert to a lesser version of themselves again.
Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani scores on a double by Freddie Freeman in the first inning Sunday against Arizona. (Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)
Asked why that has been the case pregame, Roberts struggled to find an answer.
He alluded to a potential World Series hangover, noting that “when you’re playing a long season, you’re defending champions, people are coming after you — which we know and understand — it’s just hard to keep that dialed-in focus every single night. That’s just reality.”
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He highlighted the lack of consistent production from veteran players — coinciding with his decision Sunday to leave Teoscar Hernández on the bench, in favor of Alex Call in right field, amid a recent three-for-27 slump that has been compounded by persistently shaky defense.
“He’s an everyday guy,” Roberts said of Hernández, whom the team hopes will benefit from a “two-day reset” between Sunday’s day off and Monday’s travel day. “But I do think that where we’re at, you’ve got to perform too, to warrant being out there every single day.”
Roberts said that mindset applies to the rest of the roster as a whole, from left field (where Michael Conforto has been better of late, but is still batting under .200) to other superstars at the top of the lineup.
“No one is going to be exempt,” Roberts said. “We’ve got to ramp it up and we’ve got to be better. If some other guys deserve more opportunities, then they’re going to get them. That’s just the way it should be.”
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It all reflected what Roberts hopes will be a switch-flipping moment from his club; that disaster-averting wins like Sunday outnumber the kind of clunkers they had on Friday and Saturday.
“I do think that a flip can be switched,” Roberts said. “Each day should be equally important. Every little play, pitch, should be equally important. ‘How you do anything is how you do everything,’ that kind of adage, I believe in that. When you’re playing a long season, it’s hard to be that locked in every single pitch. But I’m not going to not try to ask our guys to do that, though.”
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.