Sedona Red Recap: Hot bats push D-backs past Dodgers for fourth straight win

Coming off their first home series sweep of 2016, the Arizona Diamondbacks wanted to keep things rolling in the right direction at Chase Field.

They didn’t miss a beat on Thursday.

Kyle Jensen and Mitch Haniger homered, and Archie Bradley nabbed his seventh win of the year as the D-backs ousted the Los Angeles Dodgers by a final of 7-3 in front of 27,126 fans. With the victory, Arizona has now won four in a row, erupting for 41 runs in that stretch.

Bradley provided six decent frames of work, fanning seven L.A. hitters while allowing three runs. He worked his way out of a couple jams early and ultimately threw 64 of his 88 pitches for strikes. Meanwhile, Patrick Corbin looked dominant in relief, retiring all nine batters he faced to notch a three-inning save.

The win moves the Diamondbacks to 62-84 on the season. And for all their well-documented struggles at home this year, they’re 12-8 over their last 20 contests at Chase Field.

THE GOOD

– Bradley struck out the side in each of the first two innings.

– Kyle Jensen’s second inning homer was the second of his career – and just his fourth Major League hit.

– Brandon Drury has now reached base in 16 of his last 19 games.

– A day after being named the D-backs’ Minor League Player of the Year, Haniger hit his second home run of the season. He crushed an 0-1 pitch deep into the left-field seats with a pair of runners on in the sixth to blow the game wide open.

– Jean Segura made a nice play in the field to help stifle a Dodger rally in the seventh. With two runs already in, Chase Utley on second and only one out, Corey Seager ripped a sharp grounder up the middle. Segura scooped it up, whirled and fired to first in time to get the out. And, in the process, he prevented Utley from coming around to score.

THE BAD

– There were nearly fireworks in the top half of the fifth when Rich Hill squared to bunt on a pitch from Bradley that quickly came inside. Hill still got the bunt down but was yelling at Bradley as he was called out at first. Both dugouts and bullpens emptied, but cooler heads ultimately prevailed.

– Joc Pederson scored on a wild pitch by Bradley in the seventh.

STAT OF THE GAME

7: The number of consecutive games in which Drury has recorded an RBI. That’s a new Diamondbacks rookie record, breaking the mark set by Mark Reynolds back in 2007.

HE SAID IT

“The Rockies series was not a pretty one. Obviously, we gave up a lot of runs, we scored a lot of runs. Tonight, I felt like this was a really good baseball game.” – Diamondbacks manager Chip Hale

NOTED

– After the game, Hale announced that Arizona will be shutting Rubby De La Rosa down for the rest of 2016 – in terms of pitching in actual MLB games. He’s still going to throw sides and potentially some simulated games.

UP NEXT

The Diamondbacks and Dodgers will meet up for the second contest in this four-game series on Friday. Zack Greinke will take the mound for Arizona, while L.A. counters with Kenta Maeda. First pitch is set for 6:40 p.m. with pregame coverage beginning at 6 p.m. on Arizona Sports 98.7.

Greinke (12-6) has gotten off to a tough start in September, dropping his first two decisions of the month. He allowed three runs over six innings in a loss to the Giants on Sunday after falling hard to this Dodgers team on Sept. 5. In that outing, he served up eight runs, including five home runs, and exited after just 4.2 innings

For his career, Greinke is now 3-1 with a 4.17 ERA in six starts against his former club from LA.

Maeda (14-9), on the other hand, has been dealing lately. He’s picked up wins in six of his last eight decisions, surrendering two runs or less in seven of his last nine starts. And even in those two starts where he allowed more than two runs, he only gave up three. He did take the loss on Sept. 11, scattering two runs over six innings in a 3-0 defeat at the hands of the Marlins.

Even though this is Maeda’s first season in Major League Baseball, he’s already faced the D-backs five times, the most he’s seen any club. And he’s caused problems for Arizona in those starts, going 2-1 with a 3.18 ERA.

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