Rays defeat Dodgers 6-4 in Game2 of 2020 World Series. The Dodgers last lost in the postseason was on last Thursday, when they lost in Game 4 of the National League Championship Series. Now the World Series is tied at 1–1.
Tomorrow will be a rare day off in this year’s post-season, Game 3 is scheduled for Friday, Walker Buehler and Charlie Morton will battle it out at the mound. Julio Urías will pitch in Game 4 for Dodgers, Dave Roberts confirmed the starting pitchers for Game 3 & 4.
“We feel great,” said manager Dave Roberts. “We’ve got Walker going. We’ve got Julio going. And then we’ve got Clayton (Kershaw). And you look at where our relievers are set with the off day, we’re in a great spot.”
The Dodgers had won all three bullpen games they set up this postseason, allowing three runs in each game. But today, Rays handed first loss to Dodgers bullpen, Left with no starting pitchers on regular rest after a grueling seven-game NLCS, the Dodgers bullpenned and used seven pitchers in Game 2.
Starter Tony Gonsolin limited opposing hitters to a .443 OPS in the regular season on pitches one to 25. In his one start this postseason, he retired the first nine batters he faced in Game 2 of the NLCS. But the second batter of the game, Tampa Bay’s Brandon Lowe, hit a home run off the Dodger rookie to put his team up 1–0.
After 1 1/3 innings, Gonsolin was out. “I want the ball. I want to go out there and give our team a chance to win every time I pitch,” said Gonsolin, who pitched two innings in relief in Sunday’s Game 7. “It’s been a learning experience for me to do new things — starting and throwing within three days. But I’m just trying to take it as a learning experience and grow from there.”
The Rays got rookie Dustin May in the fourth and fifth inning. May, the Dodgers’ fourth pitcher in the game, allowed a two-run double to Joey Wendle in the fourth and a two-run homer to Lowe in the fifth.
Meanwhile, the Dodgers were completely shut down by left-hander Blake Snell. Through 4 2/3 innings, the Dodgers didn’t have a hit against the 2018 American League Cy Young Award winner. To that point, he struck out nine batters. The Dodgers were 0-for-10 with seven strikeouts against Snell breaking balls.
Then Chris Taylor struck, hitting a two-run home run in the fifth off a Snell curveball. After Mookie Betts walked and Corey Seager singled with two outs, the Rays went to right-hander Nick Anderson who stopped the Dodger threat by striking out Justin Turner.
The Rays added a sixth run on a Wendle sacrifice fly against Joe Kelly to go up 6–2. But the Dodgers struck again with the long ball. Will Smith hit a solo home run in the sixth and Corey Seager hit a solo homer in the eighth to cut the lead to 6–4.
2020 World Series LA Dodgers vs Rays Game 2 Highlights
NLCS MVP Corey Seager became the 10th player all time to hit at least seven home runs in a single postseason. All have happened since 2002. He is one away from tying Barry Bonds (2002), Carlos Beltrán (2004) and Nelson Cruz (2011) for the all-time lead.
Turner followed Seager’s homer with a no-out double in the eighth, but was left stranded.
“Overall, we did a really good job of battling,” Taylor said. “They’ve got some really good pitchers on their end. They got out to that early lead, and we just weren’t able to overcome it. But overall I thought we did a pretty good job of fighting to the end, and we just weren’t able to come up with that big hit we needed.”
With the series even, a matchup of two big-game postseason arms awaits in Game 3: Buehler against the Rays’ Charlie Morton, who beat the Dodgers in Game 7 of the 2017 World Series pitching for the Houston Astros.
