Friday could have been the night the Dodgers lost the National League West.
Instead, it turned into their best win of the season.
After leading Arizona by three runs early, the Dodgers were thrown a major plot twist in the second inning when Clayton Kershaw left the game after getting just three outs because of a bone spur on his left big toe.
Suddenly, an overworked bullpen that already was running on fumes needed to cover eight innings.
Read more: As Freddie Freeman rested his fractured finger, he got an unexpected ‘mental’ reset too
That early three-run lead evaporated too, after the first reliever to enter the game, Joe Kelly, struggled with his command in a four-out, 47-pitch appearance.
From there, however, the Dodgers produced a potentially pivotal sequence of events, playing some of their best baseball of the season at its most important juncture yet.
They scored five unanswered runs between the sixth and eighth innings, including a critical three-run home run from Will Smith in the seventh. They pieced together five shutout innings from five worn-out middle relievers, several of whom weren’t supposed to be available.
And, even though they almost blew their lead by giving up four runs in the ninth, the Dodgers held on for a 10-9 win in front of a raucous 46,606 at Chase Field, extending their NL West lead to five games over the Diamondbacks and San Diego Padres.
“It was a huge win, team win,” manager Dave Roberts said. “It certainly came at a cost, but just the way that these guys banded together, came together and persevered was huge.”
Given the Dodgers’ growing pitching concerns, the coming days (and weeks) won’t be easy.
Kershaw could be the latest starting pitcher put on the injured list, because of a bone spur that has bothered him for “years,” according to Roberts, flaring up in the first inning to the point where he couldn’t push off the mound.
“Not a lot of answers right now,” Kershaw said about the severity of his injury. “But no matter what I did, I couldn’t…