Dodgers on top again

LOS ANGELES — Rookie Walker Buehler tossed onehit ball into the seventh inning, Cody Bellinger and Max Muncy launched tworun homers, and the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Colorado Rockies 5-2 in a tiebreaker to earn their record sixth consecutive NL West title.

The defending NL champion Dodgers became the first major league team to win six straight division crowns since the Yankees captured nine AL East titles in a row from 1998-2006.

Los Angeles now hosts Atlanta in the best-of-five NL Division Series beginning Thursday.

Denied their first division title in franchise history, the Rockies head to Wrigley Field to play the Chicago Cubs in the NL wild-card game on Tuesday night.

Pitching in 90-degree heat, Buehler was oh-so-cool in closing out a regular season that ended with Game 163 after both teams had identical records of 91-71.

The soft-spoken, 24-yearold from Lexington, Ky., has been so steady of late that manager Dave Roberts had no qualms about giving Buehler the ball for the crucial game that helped decide the Dodgers’ postseason fate.

He settled in quickly, retiring his first six batters in a row, and never did allow a run.

Buehler (8-5) had his nohit bid broken up in the sixth on Charlie Blackmon’s single, one of his two hits for the Rockies.

Buehler even helped himself offensively, hitting a single in the sixth for his first professional RBI and extending the Dodgers’ lead to 5-0.

After giving up a two-out walk to Carlos Gonzalez in the seventh, Buehler exited to a standing ovation from the announced crowd of 47,816. He waved his right hand and quickly strode to the dugout as fans chanted his last name. The righthander struck out three and walked three.