Rogers strikes out 7 in 6 shutout innings
MILWAUKEE — Trevor Rogers pitched six spotless innings, Corey Dickerson finished a triple shy of the cycle and the Miami Marlins beat the Milwaukee Brewers 8-0 on Monday night.
Dickerson drove in three runs, two against Brewers starter Corbin Burnes (2-2), who had only allowed one earned run over four outings this season.
Since giving up that one run — a homer by Twins outfielder Byron Buxton on April 3 — Burnes had tossed 18 scoreless innings, striking out 29 without walking a batter while allowing a total of seven hits.
He struck out nine Monday, giving him 49 for the season, and still hasn’t issued a walk in 29 ⅓ innings. He needs three more strikeouts without a walk his next time out to break a record set in 1893.
“I’ll go back briefly tomorrow and look at the pitches on those five hits to start the sixth and see if it was a sequencing thing or they got some good pitches to hit,” Burnes said. “Then, after that, it’s back to work and get ready for the next one.”
While Burnes was having an uncharacteristically “bad” outing, at least by his own standards this season, Rogers (3-1) did his best Burnes impression by striking out seven Milwaukee batters without a walk.
His defense did its part, too, snuffing out potential rallies with double plays to end the first three innings. Rogers struck out the side in the fourth and worked around one-out singles in each of his final two innings.
“Those (double plays) were huge,” Rogers said. “That was kind of my game plan going in, getting groundballs to get out of it. I was very happy to get those early in the game.”
Burnes had struck out six when former teammate Jesus Aguilar reached on a one-out single in the fourth. After Garett Cooper struck out, Dickerson doubled to left field to give Miami a 1-0 lead.
It was still 1-0 when Jazz Chisholm Jr. led off the sixth with a ground-rule double down the right-field line. Chisholm scored when Miguel Rojas followed with a base hit up the middle and, after Aguilar singled, Cooper doubled to center. That put runners at second and third for Dickerson, who made it 4-0 with an RBI single that ended Burnes’ night.
“He has elite stuff,” Dickerson said. “I was just trying to stay aggressive and get a good pitch to hit.”
Drew Rasmussen got Milwaukee out of the inning without further damage.
Miami padded its lead in the eighth when Dickerson hit a solo shot for his first home run of the season and Jose Devers added a sacrifice fly.
“Once we got a little bit of a roll going, we were able to add on,” manager Don Mattingly said.
Cooper tacked on another run with a solo homer to center off Angel Perdomo in the ninth.
Heavy heart: At the conclusion of his postgame Zoom session, Rogers took a moment to note that he lost a close childhood friend a few days ago and wanted to dedicate his performance tonight to the memory of that friend, Carlos Gonzalez, and his family.
“We played basketball, went to school (together) from elementary school all through high school,” Rogers said. “This game meant a lot to me and to his family. I know the family is going through a lot