Hometown kid blanks Mets in Dodgers 9-0 rout

                    Los Angeles Dodgers #0 Jack Flaherty (RHP) held the New York Mets scoreless in seven innings. Photo was                                                                                                                taken by Jerry Kelly/TGSportstv1

LOS ANGELES, CA – With a pressure that would break most, Burbank native Jake Flaherty rose to the challenge putting on a pitching clinic shutting out the New York Mets 9-0 at Dodger Stadium tonight.

Flaherty pitched seven scoreless innings, striking out six while only giving up two runs. Kodai Senga was pulled early giving up three earned runs with no strikeouts with an ERA north of 20.25 in his one and a third innings for New York.

“Senga just didn’t have his A-stuff tonight,” said Dodgers manager Dave Roberts. “The split was non-competitive, he didn’t use the sweeper he was just relying on the cutter, working behind hitters, and walking guys.

The Dodgers bats set the tone early after Senga walked three straight batters to load the bases in the first inning. Max Muncy stepped up to the plate and delivered a two-run single scoring Freddie Freeman and Mookie Betts to give the Dodgers a 2-0 lead after one.

In the second inning, Senga issued another walk to Gavin Lux, followed by a pitch-clock violation by the rattled Mets pitcher. A sacrifice bunt advanced Lux to scoring position bringing Shohei Ohtani to the plate with one out. Ohtani wasted no time smashing a single on the first pitch that scored Lux. The 3-0 lead was enough for Senga to get pulled and the Mets bullpen took over.

The hit brought was Ohtani's fifth out of seven at-bats with runners in scoring position, the opposite of his 0-for-15 at-bats with the bases empty this postseason for the Dodgers slugger.

In the fourth inning, the Dodgers tacked on three more runs thanks to big base hits that put runners in a position to score including another run knocked in by Ohtani as Los Angeles led 6-0.

Flaherty showed signs of vulnerability to start the sixth inning first allowing a hit to Jesse Winker followed by a Jose Iglesias single to left field. However, Kike Hernandez made the defensive play of the game faking a throw to third, then throwing behind Winker duping the Met into a base runner mistake.

Winker had an easy path to third but slowed up and froze from the misdirection from Hernandez in the outfield. It caused Winker to second-guess his base running giving the Dodgers enough time to tag him out at third. It was a gut-punch for the Mets who would’ve had runners on first and third with no outs without the mental mistake.

Flaherty cruised the rest of the game giving the Dodgers seven scoreless innings before the bullpen finished it with another two scoreless frames winning the game 9-0.

“For us to get seven innings in a long series is huge,” said Roberts.

This was the third straight scoreless game for the Dodgers who have now gone 33 straight scoreless innings, tying a postseason record.

The Dodgers will look to break the MLB postseason consecutive scoreless innings record in the bottom of the first inning when they take on the Mets at Dodger Stadium on Monday at 1:08 pm.