ATLANTA — The Dodgers spent most of Wednesday night experiencing what Atlanta drivers get all the time.
Lots of traffic but little progress.
The Dodgers’ version featured 10 runners left on base thanks to a 1-for-10 night with runners in scoring position. The Braves finally claimed a 4-3 win with a walk-off sacrifice fly in the ninth inning.
The Braves’ win kept the Dodgers from completing a three-game sweep at Truist Park.
Dodgers starter Tony Gonsolin allowed just three hits in 5-2/3 innings. Unfortunately for Gonsolin, two of those hits traveled a combined 908 feet.
Gonsolin retired the first 10 Braves in order before Matt Olson crushed a 2-and-2 slider from him in the fourth inning, sending it 456 feet into the Georgia night and endangering patrons at the Chop House restaurant beyond the right field seats.
An inning later, Gonsolin walked Ozzie Albies and hung another slider. This one, Marcell Ozuna sent on a 452-foot journey over the wall in left-center field.
Albies was running on that 2-and-2 pitch so Dodgers catcher Will Smith was jumping out of his crouch to make a throw and was clipped in the left shoulder by Ozuna’s backswing. The two had an angry confrontation during Monday’s game when Ozuna clubbed Smith in the head with his long backswing.
Gonsolin did pitch into the sixth inning – something a Dodgers starter hadn’t done since Julio Urias went seven innings on May 13.
But a Dodgers’ offense that had scored 56 runs in the previous nine games went quiet for most of the night Wednesday. The Dodgers had seven baserunners in the first four innings against Braves starter Bryce Elder but stranded six and hit into a double play.
Mookie Betts put the Dodgers on the board with a solo home run leading off the fifth inning. But they didn’t get another runner into scoring position until the eighth when Smith led off with a single and went to third on J.D. Martinez’s double.
Jason Heyward drove in a run with a ground out. That made the Dodgers 0 for 7 with runners in scoring position for the night. Miguel Vargas finally came through, dropping a double down the left-field line to score Martinez with the tying run.
But they stranded runners at the corners in the top of the ninth and turned to Phil Bickford to keep the score tied and send the game into extra innings.
He couldn’t. Austin Riley led off with a double, went to third on a ground out and scored the game-winning run when Albies lofted a deep fly ball to right field.
