Dodgers fall to Brewers as Justin Wrobleski comes back to earth

MILWAUKEE –– For most of the year, Justin Wrobleski’s starts have almost all followed the same script.

Attack the zone. Pitch to contact. Limit damage. Breeze through quick innings.

On Friday night in Milwaukee, however, the Dodgers’ left-hander faced a contact-minded Brewers lineup uniquely adept at neutralizing his skill set.

And in a 5-1 loss at American Family Field, it led to the longest inning of Wrobleski’s breakout campaign.

In a nightmarish bottom of the first that dragged on for more than 15 minutes, Wrobleski gave up four runs on six hits and a walk, forcing him to face 10 batters and throw 38 pitches.

“They put the ball in play and they were hits,” Wrobleski said. “That’s just kind of how it goes.”

The Brewers got their game-opening –– and back-breaking –– rally started quickly.

Jackson Chourio snuck a ground ball through the infield for a leadoff single. Brice Turang followed with a line-drive knock to center. Then, William Contreras ambushed a first-pitch slider on the inside corner for a towering three-run homer deep to left field.

“Hindsight is 20-20,” Wrobleski said, “but probably not a great spot for it.”

Just like that, Wrobleski had already allowed his second-most runs in a start this season.

The grind would only continue from there, too.

With one out, Andrew Vaughn, Jake Bauers and Luis Rengifo struck together three more singles to load the bases. After a Sal Frelick sacrifice fly, Wrobleski walked No. 9 hitter Joey Ortiz to juice the bags again.

“(It’s a tough matchup when) you get a guy that’s typically been putting the ball in play against a team that does that,” manager Dave Roberts said. “But the thing I think with Justin is he’s still been able to manage the slug.”

The good news: The 25-year-old southpaw averted total disaster over the rest of his five-inning start, striking out Chourio to retire the side in the first before giving up just one run over his next four frames.

The bad news: He suffered the exact kind of struggles that more skeptical observers of his hot start had feared.

After all, Wrobleski entered the game with the lowest strikeout rate among all 78 qualified big-league pitchers. And while he’d been able to limit hard contact and be efficient in his outings previously –– he had a 2.12 ERA since moving into the rotation, and was averaging 6 ⅔ innings over seven starts in that span –– so-called “regression to mean” had been looming as a threat.

“I give him a lot of credit for bearing down and finding a way to get through five innings,” Roberts noted. “But yeah, I think early, he just made some mistakes, and they took advantage of him … The last three (outings, including an 8 2/3-inning, seven-run against the Braves earlier this month), he’s given up certainly some runs.”

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What it means

Wrobleski, it turns out, might not be invincible.

But neither was the Dodgers’ recently resurgent offense on Friday.

Instead, the club was shut down by rookie right-hander Logan Henderson, who didn’t give up a hit in his first three innings, escaped a bases-loaded jam in the fourth, and finished with seven strikeouts over five scoreless innings.

The Dodgers (31-20) didn’t get on the board until the seventh, when Shohei Ohtani hit a sacrifice fly, and finished with just three hits –– their fewest in almost two weeks.

As a result, the club has now lost nine straight regular-season games to the Brewers (30-18) dating back to 2024. Of course, they won the only four games that truly mattered when the teams crossed paths in last year’s National League Championship Series.

Who’s hot

Ohtani was the one productive member of the Dodgers lineup, reaching base twice in addition to his sac fly.

Even he wasn’t perfect, however. In the first, he drew a walk to begin the game but then was thrown out trying to steal second to retire the side. And while his leadoff single in the fourth helped generate the squandered bases-loaded opportunity, Ohtani struck out to end the fifth after Teoscar Hernández had led the inning off with a hit.

Who’s not

Both of the Dodgers’ catchers.

Before first pitch, manager Dave Roberts said the recently scuffling Will Smith –– who was dropped down to the No. 7 spot in the order in Wednesday’s series finale in San Diego –– would only start one out of three games in Milwaukee this weekend, in order to give him time to “reset” and “work on his swing” amid a .197 slump over the last month.

The only problem: Backup catcher Dalton Rushing has gone cold since his blistering start to the season, too, only snapping a recent 0-for-19 skid with a single in the seventh inning Friday.

Up next

The Dodgers will try to even this weekend series on Saturday, when Roki Sasaki (2-3, 5.09 ERA) takes the mound against left-hander Robert Gasser (0-0, 4.50 ERA).