Snell makes statement with 10 K's in return from elbow surgery
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LOS ANGELES -- Blake Snell showed plenty of rust in his season debut back in May. Three months later, the next time he took a big league mound, Snell seemed to have shaken much of it off.
Snell racked up 10 strikeouts across six innings of one-run ball on three hits and a walk against the Royals on Tuesday night, his return from his second stint on the injured list this season. The sharp outing was night and day from his first start of the season on May 9, when he gave up five runs (four earned) in three innings.
The Dodgers rallied to beat the Royals, 5-4, on Max Muncy's walk-off single in the 10th inning.
From the time that Kendrick Lamar's "tv off" began to blare over the Dodger Stadium speakers, Snell looked locked in. He struck out the side on three different pitches -- a changeup to Nick Loftin, a four-seamer to Bobby Witt Jr. and a curveball to Jac Caglianone -- in the first inning. Snell went on to retire his first 10 batters in order, striking out seven of them.
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Snell faced some trouble in the fourth inning, allowing a run on back-to-back singles followed by a Salvador Perez sacrifice fly. But that was the extent of the damage the Royals could manage against him.
The rough plan for Snell had been to reach five innings or 75-80 pitches, but he exceeded both counts, throwing 84 pitches to complete his six strong innings. He authored the seventh start with double-digit strikeouts by a Dodger this year.
Injuries have limited Snell to only two starts this season. He began the year on the 15-day IL with lingering fatigue in his left shoulder, after inflammation there had cost him a large chunk of the 2025 campaign and continued to bother him through the World Series. Snell rejoined the Dodgers' rotation in May, only to land back on the IL when loose bodies were discovered in his pitching elbow.
Snell had the NanoNeedle Scope procedure to remove the loose bodies, which expedited his recovery timeline but still kept him out of Major League action until August.