Dodger fans who were blessed to watch (or attend) Sunday’s game between their beloved team and the Arizona Diamondbacks, got to witness a blast from the past. Not only did they see their team amass seven runs on eight hits for a dominating 7-2 win over their division-leading rivals, they got to witness a vintage Clayton Kershaw.

All the 30-year-old Dallas, Texas native and Dodgers 2007 first-round draft pick out of Highland Park (Texas) High School did was allow one run on two hits, while walking none and striking out (brace yourselves) 12 in his 7.0 innings of work.

It gets better.

It was the 59th time in his 11-year major league career that Kershaw struck out 10 or more batters in a game, and the ninth time he struck out 12 or more batters without allowing a walk. (He’s 12-0 in those 12 games). The seven-time All-Star, five-time ERA champion, three-time Cy Young award winner, former Triple Crown winner, former National League MVP, former Gold Glove winner, and former Major League Player of the Year (aka: future first-ballot Hall of Famer) made a total of 100 pitches on Sunday, of which 71 were strikes; and did so on Jackie Robinson Day.

Vintage Kershaw indeed.

As that old commercial used to say, “Kershaw was lights out!” Even though the future Hall of Famer is 1-2 on the young season, he now has a remarkable 1.73 ERA through four starts. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

“The slider was better today, I mixed some shapes on it,” Kershaw said, after the game. “I threw it to the arm-side a little bit more today. You face a team, we’re going to face the Diamondbacks four times within the first two months, same thing with the Giants, you can’t be predictable, mixing things up. Barnsy [Dodgers catcher Austin Barnes] did a great job back there with that. Yeah, fortunate to get through seven and we needed a win today, obviously, so it was good.”

But even the best pitcher on the planet, as Kershaw is often called, can’t do it alone, and he was seriously victimized by a complete lack of run support from his teammates in his first three starts.

Not so on Sunday.

“Very very impressive collectively by our offense as a group,” said Dodgers manager Dave Roberts. “When we’re at our best, that’s what we were doing. We took some borderline pitches, and on that walk that Chase [Utley] had, started that inning, and it just kind of blossomed.”

That inning was the bottom of the second, during which Dodgers right fielder Yasiel Puig reached on a fielding error by Dbacks shortstop Nick Ahmed, followed by back-to-back walks to Barnes and Utley to load the bases with one out. Dodgers third baseman Kiké Hernandez then flied out to Dbacks center fielder A.J. Pollock, allowing Puig to tag up and score from third.

But the crushing blow to Arizona came in the fourth inning when, again after back-to-back walks by Dbacks ace Zack Godley – this time to Dodgers shortstop Corey Seager and left fielder Matt Kemp – followed by an infield single by Dodgers first baseman Cody Bellinger, Puig lined a single to center, scoring Seager and Kemp. Godley yet again issued back-to-back walks to Barnes and Utley, with the latter forcing in the Dodgers third run of the inning.

“When you look at that inning, I don’t know how many walks we had today but we took a lot of borderline calls and kept the line moving and stressed Godley, who came into the game as one of the best starters in the National League, a guy who throws strikes and strike his breaking ball,” Roberts said. “But we were relentless today taking balls from the strikes and, as a by-product, we scored some runs.”

Three of those runs came off the bat of Dodger fan favorite Chris Taylor, who slugged a solo home run to lead off the fourth inning, his team-leading third of the season, followed by a two-run double in the fifth, both off of Godley.

CT3’s two-run double in the fifth inning sealed the deal for the Dodgers and secured Kershaw’s first win of the 2018 campaign. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

Even though the Dodgers lost the first two games of the three-game set to the Diamondbacks and had lost 11 straight regular season games heading into Sunday’s series finale, Puig has been on fire against them in the early goings this season, What does Roberts attribute this to?

“He’s being very disciplined in his zone,” Roberts answered. “Everyone has a different zone and Yasiel’s is one out over the plate. And I think that if you look at this series, he’s done a good job of taking balls in and off [the plate], and looking out and over, and he had some good at-bats. The base hit early, it was huge for us. He’s had some big at-bats for us.”

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts called Puig’s two-run single in the bottom of the third inning “…huge for us.”
(Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

Why the sudden turnaround for the Dodgers who, quite frankly, had been having some of the ugliest at-bats on record, resulting in a 4-9 NL West last-place record heading into Sunday’s contest?

“Chase and JT [Justin Turner] just kind of reminded us of who we are and what made us so successful last year,” explained Barnes.

Go figure.