The Walker Buehler who retired 11 of 12 batters with six strikeouts from the second through fifth innings Saturday night could play in a postseason rotation for the Dodgers.
The Buehler who gave up three runs and three hits, walked one batter and hit another while throwing 42 pitches in the first two choppy innings? Not so much.
The start-to-start consistency and the extended stretches of dominance that made Buehler the team’s ace from 2019 to 2021 continued to elude the right-hander in a 6-3 loss to the Colorado Rockies before a sold-out crowd of 52,267 in Chavez Ravine, further muddling the team’s playoff pitching picture.
Buehler, who missed the first five weeks of the season recovering from his second Tommy John surgery and two months from mid-June to mid-August because of a left-hip injury, gave up four earned runs and five hits in 5⅓ innings, striking out nine and walking one, to fall to 1-6 with a 5.63 earned-run average in 13 starts.
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Saturday night’s uneven performance somewhat negated the progress Buehler made in his previous start, when he battled through early command issues in a six-inning, two-run (one earned), five-strikeout effort in a 9-2 win at Atlanta on Sept. 15.
“I’ve had some rough patches where I’ve really questioned if I have the stuff to compete,” Buehler said. “Tonight, I felt like I could compete, and I just didn’t make the big pitches in the big spots, or I kind of made little mistakes in the big spots, and that’s frustrating. … There were some encouraging things about it, but obviously not good enough at this point of the year, when we’re trying to keep the lead in the division.”
The loss reduced the Dodgers’ National League West lead to three games over San Diego and five over Arizona and kept their magic number to clinch the division at five with seven games left, three against the Padres at home this week.
Buehler put the Dodgers in an early hole, continuing his pattern of early-inning struggles followed by three or four innings of effectiveness.
“He’s putting himself in some stress in the first inning,” manager Dave Roberts said. “We have to figure out a way to get that clean…