Dodgers dominate stumbling Padres and prove

Slammed Diego.

Those pesky rivals from down south staggered away from their weekend keep at Dodger Stadium Sunday with spirits bruised, egos bloodied and Manny Machado flattened.

Canned Diego.

Arriving right here shortly after stealing first place, little brother spent the next three days giving it back to a Dodger crew that met the second while the Padres recoiled from it.

Fanned Diego.

It was a sweeping sweep of a sweep, the Dodgers successful their third consecutive recreation from the Padres Sunday by a 5-4 margin that doesn’t start to elucidate the distinction between these two groups.

The Dodgers now lead the National League West by two video games, but it appears like 20. Both groups have 38 video games remaining in the season, including three next weekend in San Diego, but any type of real problem by the Padres feels fabricated.

The Dodgers are the deeper crew. The Dodgers are the more centered crew. The Dodgers are the better crew.

The remaining weekend blow was an eighth-inning, game-winning drive into the left-field pavilion by Mookie Betts, but this sequence wasn’t almost that close.

The Dodgers did every little thing proper, and the Padres did every little thing dumb.

The Dodgers charged, and the Padres choked.

“Didn’t play as well as we’d like to have, and the series didn’t go like we wanted it to,” Padres supervisor Mike Shildt said. “But … this team is more than in a great place.”

That would nonetheless presently be second place, which, after this weekend, looks like an acceptable spot.

Meanwhile, for one of the few stretches in this curious summer season, the Dodgers behaved just like the first-place tenants they’re.

“I don’t think anyone in that clubhouse doubted our abilities and how good we can be,” Dodgers supervisor Dave Roberts said. “Honestly, it was just good to play a really good series, start to finish.”

Truly, from start to end. The injury-prone Dodgers starters allowed just three runs in 17 innings, the much-maligned Dodger bullpen completed with just three allowed runs in 10 innings, and the Padres have been unhealthy enough that nothing else mattered.

On Friday, Machado gave the Dodgers a run when he botched a bunt, and later swiftly popped out on the first pitch in the eighth inning with two out and the tying and go-ahead runs on base.

On Saturday, the Padres have been thrown out making an attempt to steal 3 times in the first two innings while heart fielder Jackson Merrill added to the insanity by dropping a fly ball that price them two runs.

Then on Sunday, the Padres outhit the Dodgers 10-6 but couldn’t get out of their own manner long enough to ever pose a real menace.

In the third inning, Freddy Fermín ran into an out on a single to right-center, Andy Pages nailing him by a mile. Then, with a runner on third and two out, Machado swung at the second pitch and grounded out to first.

Two innings later, Machado stranded two more runners with a groundout, but his humiliation was just starting. In the seventh, Machado threw his bat and walked toward first on a strike call. After sheepishly returning to home plate amid a taunting roar from the hostile Dodger Stadium crowd, he flied out with a runner on second.

Machado wasn’t carried out yet. Appropriately, he was the ultimate out of the sport, swinging wildly at an Alex Vesia fastball for a strikeout on a foul tip that left the previous Dodger one for 12 for the weekend.

“We can blink, and I’m pretty confident within a week or so, we’ll be talking and be like, ‘Man, Manny’s got eight RBIs in the last five days,’ so we’re not concerned about it,” said Shildt, who claimed his star was stung by unhealthy calls by home plate umpire Jeremie Rehak. “Unfortunately, some pitches that are outside the strike zone got called on him. Which, again, is unfortunate when they’re not trying to throw strikes all the time to him. They’re taking their chances and to get rewarded on balls that are outside the zone is a little frustrating.”

Before the sequence, in the wake of 4 consecutive dispiriting losses, Roberts called on his crew to show more focus and urgency. Their remaining reply, on a day they might have simply shrugged off after successful the first two video games of the sequence, got here rapidly and dramatically.

Tyler Glasnow, pitching in his greatest recreation as a Dodger, struck out three in the top of the first en route to eight strikeouts in 5 innings.

Freddie Freeman, proper, celebrates with Shohei Ohtani after hitting a three-run home run in the first inning Sunday against the Padres.

(Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)

Then, in the underside of the first against the Padres’ Yu Darvish, Shohei Ohtani singled, Betts walked and Freddie Freeman blasted a home run over the right-center area fence. One out later, Pages homered to left and the tone had been set.

“I think we all know who we are in here, in this team and how good we can be,” said Freeman. “We just gotta play good baseball like we did this weekend … we know who we are inside. And gotta keep it going.”

Roberts was as good as any of them, doing a masterful job all weekend handling his outmanned bullpen, succeeding again Sunday by listening to his most dependable reliever.

After ending up an eighth inning during which the Padres tied the sport on a Jose Iglesias grounder, Vesia was promptly told he was carried out for the day, as Justin Wrobleski was scheduled to pitch the ninth.

But Vesia had a better thought. He told Roberts he needed the ball if the Dodgers took the lead in the eighth, and when Betts homered, Vesia was prepared.

“So I told Doc, I walked up to him and said, ‘Hey, like, if we’re up, I want it.’” Vesia recalled. “He was like, ‘OK, you got it.’ Sure enough, Mook, bang, homers. Sweet, let’s go.”

Sweet certainly. Vesia’s hitless ninth was symbolic of a bullpen that spent the weekend making every big pitch … while the Padres missed every big pitch.

“It’s the dawg, right?” said Vesia. “We still have that. That doesn’t just go away. Every single one of us, we’re leaning on each other. And we know as a group how good we are.”

So, too, do the Padres.

Done Diego.