Pirates’ 6-2 win officially eliminates Dodgers from N.L. West
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And that’s what a game in late September between two disappointing teams looks like.
Uneventful, long, slow, watched by precious few and filled with plenty of players who started this season in the minors.
For the Dodgers, it added up to a 6-2 loss Thursday night to the Pittsburgh Pirates, a defeat that officially eliminated them from the National League West Division race.
So much for those great comeback hopes.
The game was watched by an announced crowd of 25,381, the lowest official crowd of the season, though there have certainly been games with fewer actually in the seats.
Six of the nine Dodgers who started Thursday began their 2011 baseball journey in the minors. This is the time when you look at the kids, of course, when you’re out of the race and playing another team with nothing on the line.
The game did mark the first major-league start for Tim Federowicz, the catcher the Dodgers acquired in the Trayvon Robinson deal in August. In his first at-bat, he was welcomed to the majors by getting hit with a pitch. He did single in his second at-bat.
The pitcher the Dodgers couldn’t handle, on the mound or at the plate, was the unheralded Ross Ohlendorf.
Ohlendorf had won one game in his last 32 starts. He entered the night with an 8.03 earned-run average. In his last start, he gave up six runs on 10 hits in two innings to the Florida Marlins.
Against these Dodgers on Thursday night, he was an entirely different pitcher. He went seven innings, holding the Dodgers to two runs on four hits. He was a model of efficiency, not walking a batter and throwing only 72 pitches.
He had another out-of-body experience in the second inning, when he hit a three-run homer off Dana Eveland. In 100 career at-bats in the majors, he had never had an extra-base hit or driven in a run.
Eveland (2-1), the soft-throwing left-hander who had consecutive strong outings since being called up at the beginning of the month, never looked particularly sharp Thursday. He lasted five innings, surrendering four runs on eight hits and a walk.
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-- Steve Dilbeck