Three Dodgers Go Deep as LA Buries Athletics 9-4
The Dodgers trailed by a run after a wild second inning, then responded with three home runs across the middle frames to pull away 9-4. Shohei Ohtani's three-run shot to right in the sixth — 432 feet — was the exclamation point on a game Los Angeles controlled from the fourth inning forward.
The second inning was a mess, and it belonged to the Athletics first. Los Angeles jumped out 2-0 on back-to-back singles from Max Muncy and Dalton Rushing, but the Athletics answered immediately. Colby Thomas hit a 395-foot homer to right center to make it 2-1, then Josh Kuroda-Grauer singled home a run to tie it, and a fielder's choice groundout pushed the go-ahead run across to put the Athletics up 3-2. For a moment, it looked like the Dodgers had handed the game away in the same inning they'd built a lead.
They didn't stay down long. Muncy opened the fourth with a 422-foot shot to right center to tie it at 3, and then Andy Pages followed with a two-run homer to left — 387 feet — to put LA ahead 5-3. That swing was the turning point: the Athletics' win probability dropped from 45% to 25% the moment Pages' ball cleared the fence. The game, for all practical purposes, was over right there. Ohtani then put it completely out of reach in the sixth, launching a 432-foot, three-run homer to right that made it 8-3 and rendered the final three innings a formality. A Freeman single in the eighth pushed it to 9-3, and a wild pitch in the ninth accounted for the Athletics' final run.
The story of the night was the Dodgers' middle-of-the-order depth. Muncy, Pages, and Ohtani each went 2-for-5 with a home run, combining for seven RBI — the kind of redundancy that looks like a structural advantage rather than a hot night. Rushing added two runs scored and an RBI of his own, quietly effective in a supporting role. On the mound, Eric Lauer gave up nine hits and three earned runs over six innings — not dominant, but enough to keep Los Angeles in position to win. Kyle Hurt was sharp in relief, striking out all three batters he faced in a clean ninth. For the Athletics, Kuroda-Grauer went 3-for-4 with an RBI and was one of the few bright spots, but Gage Jump's 4.2-inning relief appearance — 11 hits and five earned runs allowed — is what will define the pitching line. The Dodgers, sitting atop the MLB power rankings at the season's midpoint, appear to be exactly what their record suggests: a team with too many ways to beat you.