L.A. dodges elimination, again
Seager, Buehler lift Dodgers over Braves, force Game 7
ARLINGTON, Texas — Corey Seager homered again, Walker Buehler pitched six scoreless innings and the Los Angeles Dodgers pushed the NL Championship Series to Game 7 with a 3-1 win over the Atlanta Braves on Saturday.
The Dodgers avoided elimination for the second time in less than 24 hours, and now have a winnertake-all game to try to get to their third World Series in four years. They haven't won a championship since 1988.
“I'm still sort of recovering from this one, but already thinking about Game 7,” manager Dave Roberts said. “That's what you live for.”
Max Fried took his first loss all year for the Braves, who were trying to celeb ra t e ma n a g e r B r i a n Snitker's 65th birthday with the franchise's first World Series since 1999.
But the young left-hander worked into the seventh without allowing another run after LA's three-run first.
“Shoot, we'll go out there and let ‘er fly. A Game 7 is another baseball game,” Snitker said. “It's not fourth-and-1 and let me get the first down. It's a baseball game. You have to treat it as such.”
Game 7 is Sunday night, with Roberts staying quiet about his starter and the Braves going with rookie right-hander Ian Anderson, who has thrown 15 2/3 scoreless innings in his three postseason starts. The Dodgers could go with Tony Gonsolin or give the ball to Clayton Kershaw on short rest.
Justin Turner also homered for the NL West champions, and Kenley Jansen threw a six-pitch ninth for his 18th career postseason save.
It was Jansen's first save chance in five appearances since closing out the Dodgers' first playoff win this season in the wild-card round. He struck out the side on 12 pitches in Friday night's 7-3 win.
“Two huge outings, not only for us, but him personally, you can just see the confidence he has on the mound attacking guys,” Turner said. “That's the Kenley Jansen I and all of us in there all know and love.”
Fried allowed only two homers in his 11 starts while going 7-0 during the regular season, but the Dodgers went deep twice in three pitches in the first.
Seager pulled a towering shot to right on a 73-mph curveball, and Turner connected on a 93-mph sinker that went 418 feet to straightaway center. Max Muncy walked and scored after back-to-back singles by Will Smith and Cody Bellinger.