SAN DIEGO — After his two-home run game Friday night, Mookie Betts said he had to take “ownership of sucking” during the season’s early weeks.

Betts is almost certainly just renting temporarily. But he had to pay the property taxes again Saturday night.

The game kept coming to Betts as the Dodgers struggled to get their offense going. But he struck out four times — once with the bases loaded, once with runners at the corners — and the Dodgers lost, 3-2, in 10 innings to the San Diego Padres.

“Last night was one game. It’s not like I was banging for a long time so it’s really just one game,” Betts said of failing to build on Friday’s breakout.

“I did (have chances to come through) and I failed every single time. It’s not like I wasn’t trying. I’m doing my best. I mean, I don’t know. I don’t have the answers.”

Trea Turner does.

“Heck yeah — baseball stinks,” Turner said when asked if he sympathized with what Betts is going through. “Baseball is so hard. … Like, I felt terrible my first three at-bats and then I hit a double and he was kind of vice versa yesterday. He was really good and today it just wasn’t there necessarily.

“That’s baseball. We all go through it. It’s hard to be really good each and every day. That’s why I think hitting a baseball is the toughest thing to do in sports. He’s really good at it. He’ll be fine. Last night was special and I’m sure there will be plenty more of that this season. But, we ran into a good pitcher tonight in Yu Darvish. He was great — and yeah, that’s baseball.”

Infamous in L.A. for his inability to survive the second inning of a certain World Series start, Padres starter Yu Darvish nearly couldn’t get through two innings against the Dodgers Saturday. He wobbled his way through their lineup once, allowing a hit and walking three of the first nine batters he faced.

Back-to-back walks to Chris Taylor and Gavin Lux loaded the bases against Darvish with two outs in the second inning. Darvish nearly hit Betts with a pitch on the way to a full count. But Betts swung and missed at an 88-mph cutter to end the inning.

Darvish threw 33 pitches to navigate that inning, 51 to get through the first two. It was smooth sailing from there. Starting with Betts, he retired the final 13 Dodgers he faced in order, striking out five of them and throwing 39 pitches over the final four innings. He handed a one-hit shutout over to the bullpen.

“I think it was all about the slider,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of the difference in Darvish. “Yu’s a guy that’s unique in the sense that, it’s a slider but the slider does a lot of different things. So whether it has the depth, the lane changing right to left, or it just backs up. He pitched a heck of a ballgame.

“Once he got through that second inning, it was a heavy dose of the slider, a little split change and then the fastball kind of in and out. We had our chance, and he settled in.”

The Dodgers set the table for Betts again in the eighth. He struck out against Padres reliever Luis Garcia and Taylor Rogers came in to get Freddie Freeman the same way. But Turner came through with a two-out, game-tying double off Rogers.

Turner had followed his 27-game hitting streak with a 3-for-22 stretch before sending his drive over the head of left fielder Jurickson Profar in left field. Profar took a less-than-direct route to the warning track and came up empty on his running leap for the ball.

The game went into extra innings (the Dodgers’ first of the season). Given the free runner to start the 10th, the Dodgers squandered that opportunity as well when Taylor tagged up on a fly ball to left field and was thrown out at third base. Betts’ fourth strikeout of the game ended that inning.

“It was a good baseball play,” Roberts said of Taylor’s gamble. “He felt that it was deep enough. Then when you get a guy going back and catching it on his back leg, he’s got to make a perfect throw. You got to give Profar credit. He made a perfect throw.”

The Dodgers’ bullpen followed starter Tyler Anderson and the Padres had just one hit after the fifth inning. They didn’t need one to push across the winning run, cashing in their free runner on a sacrifice bunt and a walkoff sacrifice fly by Austin Nola.

“We had some situations, especially me, just didn’t come through and anytime you don’t come through or at least score one, it kind of builds his (Darvish’s) confidence,” Betts said. “At that point, once his confidence is up, he’s one of the best pitchers in the game.

“Trea did a great job in that (eighth-inning) situation. Seemed like every situation, I was up, and I failed. I let us down. Be ready for tomorrow.”

Related Articles