Clayton Kershaw, Dodger teammates bask in glow of

It wasn’t so a lot the end result of a profession as it was one other signpost pointing the best way to the Hall of Fame.

It actually wasn’t the final pitch Clayton Kershaw will ever throw for the Dodgers, but it’s going to seemingly be among essentially the most memorable.

Because when Chicago White Sox third baseman Vinny Capra took a 1-and-2 slider for a strike to finish the sixth inning Wednesday evening, Kershaw turned just the twentieth pitcher in main league historical past to file 3,000 strikeouts.

More people have flown to the moon than have struck out 3,000 main league hitters. And for Kershaw, who has been chasing historical past since he threw his first big-league pitch as a skinny 20-year-old, coming into such an elite membership might be a huge piece of his legacy.

Only now he has the knowledge and the grace to notice it was never about him in the first place.

“It’s an incredible list. I’m super, super grateful to be a part of it,” Kershaw mentioned. “But if you don’t have anybody to celebrate with, it just doesn’t matter.”

Kershaw would know since he’s one of the most embellished gamers in historical past. Twice a 20-game winner, a five-time ERA champion and two-time world champion, he’s received three Cy Young Awards, was a league MVP and is a 10-time All-Star.

“The individual stuff,” he repeated, “is only as important as the people around you.”

So while Kershaw stood out when he reached the 3K milestone on the one centesimal and remaining pitch he threw in the Dodgers’ 5-4 win, he refused to stand aside, pausing on his approach off the sector to level at his household sitting in their typical seats in the entrance row of the loge part. He then accepted hugs from teammates Mookie Betts and Kiké Hernández.

But he saved his warmest embrace for supervisor Dave Roberts, who bounded up the dugout steps to greet him.

“We’ve been through a lot together,” mentioned Roberts, who has guided Kershaw through doubts and disappointments, through high factors and lows in their 10 years collectively.

“I’m one of the few people in uniform that has been through them,” Roberts mentioned. “That was kind of what the embrace was.”

Kershaw, 37, is just the fourth left-hander to attain 3,000 strikeouts but more important, he mentioned, is the very fact he’s just the second in a century, after Bob Gibson, to do it with the identical workforce. No pitcher, in reality, has spent more years in a Dodger uniform that Kershaw.

“I don’t know if I put a ton of stock in being with one team early on,” he mentioned. “Over time you get older and appreciate one organization a little bit more. Doc [Roberts] stuck with me, too. It hasn’t been all roses, I know that.

“So there’s just a lot of mutual respect and I’m super grateful now, looking back, to get to say that I spent my whole career here. And I will spend my whole career here.”

Kershaw struck out the first batter he confronted in his Dodgers debut 18 years in the past, getting the Cardinals’ Skip Schumaker to wave at a 1-and-2 pitch. It was the first of three strikeouts he would file in his first big-league inning. So even from the beginning, the Ok in Kershaw — the scorebook image for a strikeout — stood out more than than the remainder of the identify.

In between Schumaker and Capra, Kershaw fanned almost 1,000 completely different hitters, from CJ Abrams and Bobby Abreu to Ryan Zimmerman and Barry Zito.

He’s struck out (Jason) Castro and (Buddy) Kennedy, Elvis (Andrus) and (Alex) Presley and (Billy) Hamilton and (Alex) Jackson. He’s whiffed (Scott) Cousins and brothers (Bengie and Yadier Molina), a (Chin-lung) Hu and a Yu (Darvish), a Cook (Aaron) and a (Jeff) Baker as effectively as a Trout (Mike) and a number of Marlins (Miami).

Former Giant Brandon Belt was Kershaw’s most frequent sufferer, hanging out 30 instances in 62 at-bats. Fewer than 50 batters have confronted him at least 5 instances without hanging out, according to Baseball Reference.

Along the best way Kershaw’s distinctive windup, the best knee pausing as he lifts both fingers just above his cap, has turn into an immediately recognizable silhouette for a era of Dodgers followers.

There’s only one different left-hander in workforce historical past that can examine with Kershaw, yet he and Sandy Koufax are so completely different the comparisons are more contrasts than something.

Kershaw has been good over everything of his 18-year profession, successful 10 or more video games 12 instances. He’s never completed a season with a dropping file and his profession ERA of 2.52 is the bottom of the final 105 years for pitchers who have thrown at least 1,500 innings. Even at 37, he’s unbeaten in 4 choices.

Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw walks off the mound after recording his 3,000th profession strikeout as proper fielder Andy Pages, left, and first baseman Freddie Freeman, proper, react behind him.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

Koufax was 36-40 with an ERA above 4.00 through his first six seasons. And while Koufax’s profession was ended by harm before his thirty first birthday, Kershaw has pushed through repeated issues with his back, shoulder, knee, toe, elbow, pelvis and forearm.

Only Don Sutton has received more video games in a Dodger uniform than the 216 that belong to Kershaw, who will soon be enshrined next to Koufax and Sutton in the Hall of Fame.

“Early on they were talking about this next Sandy Koufax guy, this big left-hander. Really didn’t have an idea where the ball was going, but pretty special,” mentioned Roberts, who retired as a participant after Kershaw’s rookie season. “It’s much better to be wearing the same uniform as him.”

But Roberts has seen the opposite facet, when the younger promise offers approach to pitfalls. He’s seen Kershaw battle so many accidents, he’s spent almost as a lot time on the injured record as in the rotation over the final 5 seasons. Alongside the brilliance, he’s seen the uncertainty.

So with Kershaw approaching historical past Wednesday, Roberts loosened the leash, letting him go back to the mound for the sixth inning despite having thrown 92 pitches, his most in more than two years.

“I wanted to give Clayton every opportunity,” he mentioned. “You could see the emotion that he had today, trying to get that third strike. But I think it just happened the way it’s supposed to happen, in the sense that it was the third out [and] we got a chance to really celebrate him.”

Each time Kershaw bought to two strikes, one thing he did to 15 of the 27 hitters he confronted, “I said a few Hail Marys,” Roberts mentioned.

“It’s the last box for Clayton to check in his tremendous career,” he added, saying he doubted many more pitchers will ever attain 3,000 strikeouts. “You’ve got to stay healthy, you’ve got to be good early in your career, you’ve got to be good for a long time.”

And Kershaw has been all of that.

That, Roberts mentioned, was behind the second long hug he and his pitcher shared in the dugout Wednesday evening as a spotlight reel of Kershaw’s profession performed on the video boards above both outfield pavilions. The sellout crowd, which had long been on its toes, persevering with cheering, finally drawing Kershaw back out onto the sector to doff his cap in appreciation.

“That ovation,” he mentioned, “was something that I’ll never forget, for sure.”

Because who needs to have a good time alone?