PHOENIX — Go get it out of the cactus.

Facing surly left-hander Madison Bumgarner, the Dodgers hit three home runs off him – two in a four-run second inning – and beat the Arizona Diamondbacks, 6-4, on Friday night at Chase Field.

The Dodgers’ battles with the former leader of the rival San Francisco Giants’ staff have turned one-sided. Bumgarner has not beaten the Dodgers since 2017. In 11 starts against them since then, he is 0-8 with a 4.15 ERA – and 14 home runs allowed.

“I mean, compared to yesterday,” Mookie Betts said after saying the offense was “slow” Friday. “In the grand scheme of things, six runs should win a ballgame especially with our pitching staff. It came a little slow, but it came within the game.

“But we scored six and that should win us the game.”

It has just been an average night in May. They have scored 160 runs in 25 games this month — an average of 6.4 per game — while going 18-7.

The 32-year-old Bumgarner found his first trouble in an unexpected spot – the bottom of the Dodgers’ lineup. He walked Justin Turner to start the second inning (throwing ball four behind Turner) but retired the next two Dodgers.

Hanser Alberto extended the inning with a single, bringing up left-handed Edwin Rios.

With Max Muncy likely headed to the injured list after unsuccessfully trying to play through his elbow injury, Rios has gotten an extended run at DH over the past week. Friday was his sixth consecutive start – but first against a left-handed starting pitcher so he was dropped to ninth in the order.

Bumgarner got ahead of Rios 1-and-2 and misfired with a fastball, leaving it up and in.

“He’s a up-ball hitter and they were trying to go away,” Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo said. “It was just a misfire. It was just right in Rios’ wheelhouse.”

Rios hammered it over the right-field wall for a three-run homer. It was only the fourth of Rios’ 19 career home runs to come off a left-handed pitcher, the first since 2020.

“I talk to Freddie (Freeman) a lot. I feel like he always has a great approach,” Rios said. “So I was just trying to stay inside his mix, drive it hard to center field. He threw a heater up and in. I was just able to get my barrel to it and watched it go.”

Two pitches later, Betts made it back-to-back homers, sending a Bumgarner changeup 409 feet into the left-field seats. Betts once again leads the National League with 13 home runs. He has an extra-base hit in his past eight consecutive starts and a run scored in his past 14 starts.

That early 4-0 lead must have been soothing for Ryan Pepiot. The rookie was making his third big-league start and this one seemed to be less of an out-of-body experience for him.

He hit Daulton Varsho with a pitch in the top of the first (Varsho later left the game). But Pepiot held the Diamondbacks scoreless on one hit (a bunt against the shift) through four innings before running into trouble and exiting in the fifth.

Related Articles

“I think it was just one wild pitch. Kind of slid with my foot and hit him,” Pepiot said. “But after that, I was just like ‘Alright, got a guy on to lead off the game, so bear down and make some pitches.’

“I thought mechanically it felt a lot better (this start). And even when I did miss I feel like I was able to come back and make a pitch.”

The Diamondbacks scored one run in the fifth inning before Brusdar Graterol retired the side.

Trea Turner led off the sixth with a towering fly ball that came down in the Diamondbacks’ bullpen for the third homer off Bumgarner. That extended Turner’s current hitting streak to 19 games, the longest in MLB this season, and he added an RBI single in the seventh.

“I made a mid-game adjustment and it paid off,” Turner said.

“For me, I think my posture is big. When I lose my posture and get bent over too much I start doing some wacky stuff and hooking balls foul – which I’ve done a lot lately. I’ve hit a lot of foul homers. Finally today I kept that one fair. I think that’s a good sign for me. What I normally do is keep the ball fair even when I pull it. So that’s a step in the right direction. Gotta continue to make that a habit. I created some bad habits but I think we’re on the right track.”

That provided some padding for a problematic closeout by the Dodgers’ bullpen. Alex Vesia gave up a run in the seventh, Daniel Hudson hit two batters in the eighth and Craig Kimbrel struggled in the ninth.

The first three Diamondbacks reached base against Kimbrel – a single, a walk and an RBI double by Josh Rojas. Another run scored before Kimbrel put his foot down and closed it out.