Pinch hitter Ha-Seong Kim delivered a walk-off single, lifting the Atlanta Braves to a 6-5 victory over the visiting Los Angeles Dodgers on Wednesday.
Kim got his first at-bat since Aug. 15, and he came to the plate batting .066 (5-for-76) on the season. Facing Tanner Scott (1-5), he laced a base hit to left, giving the Braves their third straight win overall as Atlanta clinched the season series over Los Angeles.
Lane Thomas scored the winning run after reaching on a two-out double.
Victor Mederos (3-1) struck out two in a scoreless top of the ninth for the Braves. Drake Baldwin and Sean Murphy both had three hits in the win.
Making just his third start of the season, Atlanta’s AJ Smith-Shawver threw five innings of three-run, five-hit ball while striking out three and walking three.
Dodgers starter Roki Sasaki allowed four runs on six hits in 3 1/3 innings. He struck out three and walked two before exiting with a blister on his middle finger. He will go on the 15-day injured list, manager Dave Roberts said postgame.
Atlanta struck first on Matt Olson’s solo homer in the bottom of the first. Olson increased his homer total to 37, trailing only the 40 hit by the Philadelphia Phillies’ Kyle Schwarber.
In the top of the second, Tommy Edman doubled and scored on Hunter Feduccia’s two-out single to left-center.
The Dodgers took a 3-1 lead in the third when Freddie Freeman doubled and scored on Edman’s two-run homer.
Austin Riley drove in the second Atlanta run with a sacrifice fly in the fourth. Murphy then doubled and Sasaki exited with the injury. Edgardo Henriquez entered and allowed Baldwin’s two-run double that gave the Braves a 4-3 edge.
Atlanta doubled the margin in the sixth as Murphy connected on his first homer of the season.
Dylan Lee started the seventh for Atlanta on the mound. The left-hander allowed Shohei Ohtani’s leadoff double before Freeman and Mookie Betts singled to pull the Dodgers within one.
After walking Max Muncy to load the bases, Lee was lifted for Didier Fuentes, who walked Edman to tie the game at 5.
Fuentes retired Kyle Tucker on a line drive and got Alek Thomas to ground into an inning-ending double play.
Both teams wasted prime scoring opportunities in the eighth. After Teoscar Hernandez’s infield single and a pair of two-out walks loaded the bases, Fuentes struck out Muncy in a nine-pitch battle.
Atlanta put runners on second and third with no outs after Baldwin’s second double, but a groundout and a 6-4-3 double play after an intentional walk kept the game level.
–Field Level Media
