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The Dodgers spent about 33 hours at Wrigley Field this weekend and collected three wins, completing a sweep of the Chicago Cubs with a 7-1 victory Sunday night.
Add this weekend’s work to their four-game, 26-7 dismissal of the Cincinnati Reds, the lowest of baseball’s low, at home last month and the Dodgers’ 19-7 record includes a 7-0 mark against the NL Central. Next stop on their tour of baseball’s woebegone – Pittsburgh.
The Dodgers outscored the Cubs 20-3 in their quick sweep of the North Siders. If not for Willson Contreras – the lone Cub with a chance of making the playoffs (after a trade-deadline move to a contender) – it could have been a complete whitewash.
The Dodgers shut out the Cubs in the first game of Saturday’s doubleheader, Contreras went 3 for 4 with a double and a home run, scoring both of the Cubs’ runs in their 6-2 loss in Game 2.
Rafael Ortega led off the bottom of the first inning Sunday night with a double into the left-field corner. He moved to third when Will Smith’s throw back to the pitcher hit the bat of the hitter standing at the plate and caromed away from Walker Buehler.
Buehler nearly stranded Ortega but Contreras dumped a two-out RBI single into right field.
The Cubs presented no problem for Buehler after that. They got just one runner past first base after the first inning — Rafael Ortega walked in the third inning and stole second base, going no farther as Buehler struck out Seiya Suzuki and Ian Happ. Buehler allowed just four hits and walked two over seven innings, striking out six and getting a season-high 15 swings-and-misses.
The win comes in Buehler’s 100th career start, giving him a 43-13 record. According to ESPN Stats & Info, Buehler’s winning percentage (.768) through his first 100 starts is the second-best in MLB history behind Hall of Famer Whitey Ford’s .773 (58-17).
The Dodgers took the lead quietly enough in the fourth inning, scoring twice on a pair of infield singles, two walks, a wild pitch and a sacrifice fly.
Two more scored in the fifth on consecutive singles by Gavin Lux, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman and a run-scoring double play. And the Dodgers added two more in the ninth on a Lux single, Freeman double and an error by Cubs shortstop Nico Hoerner that let them both score.
Betts was 2 for 5 in the game, extending his hitting streak to nine games during which he has five multi-hit games. Since bottoming out with a .178 average after the Dodgers’ win over the Atlanta Braves on April 20, Betts is batting .352 (19 for 54) with five home runs and a double.