Dodgers match season-high win streak with 6th straight as they sweep Bucs

LOS ANGELES -- "I Love L.A." was on repeat this weekend at Dodger Stadium.

From the moment Blake Snell tossed his first pitch to when Alex Vesia slammed the door in the ninth, it was all Dodgers as they polished off a three-game sweep of the Pirates with a 4-0 shutout on Sunday afternoon. L.A. is the second team in the Majors to win 80 games, joining Milwaukee.

The Dodgers have won six straight games for the second time this season. Before the season-high-tying winning streak, they had lost 11 of their past 16 games. Manager Dave Roberts is hopeful that his team can carry forth this quality of play in the upcoming series against the Braves, who are also in the mix for a first-round postseason bye.

"I thought the defense was way better, baserunning better. There were no mental mistakes," Roberts said. "And just kind of overall, I saw better at-bats and beating the starter, which we hadn't done consistently in a while."

The Dodgers led from the time Mookie Betts drove in a run while grounding into a double play in the first inning. They got some key contributions from the bottom of the order, with Alek Thomas and Hunter Feduccia knocking back-to-back RBI singles in the fourth inning, and Max Muncy added further insurance with a run-scoring groundout in the fifth.

But Sunday was all about run prevention. And all weekend long, starting pitching set the tone.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto got the ball rolling with 6 1/3 innings of two-run ball on Friday. Tarik Skubal earned his first win as a Dodger after striking out 11 across seven innings of three-run ball on Saturday. Snell capped the weekend with a commanding outing of his own, striking out six while scattering three walks and two hits across six scoreless innings.

The Dodgers have yet to truly see their rotation at full strength -- and that definition changed after the blockbuster deal to acquire Skubal ahead of the Trade Deadline. With Tyler Glasnow set to return on Tuesday and Shohei Ohtani not long behind, L.A.'s dream rotation will soon become reality.

"We got a ton of really good arms here, a ton of talent, and it’s just about us going out there and playing baseball and executing," Skubal said. "And when we’re doing that, we’re the best team in the league.”

Having Snell back has made an immediate impact. Since returning from the injured list earlier this month, the left-hander has pitched six innings in all three of his starts and allowed just two earned runs overall.

Snell is his own harshest critic. His results speak for themselves, but he lamented the three two-out walks he issued on Sunday. He would have preferred to close out those innings faster and put himself in a position to have pitched deeper into the game.

"It's not acceptable," Snell said. "I feel good, I know I can command the ball. Honestly, it's lazy. It's me trying to get strikeouts instead of trying to go seven, eight, nine. So I definitely got to clean that up."

Even with some things to iron out, Snell has shown few signs of rust after spending the majority of the season rehabbing, first from left shoulder fatigue and then from surgery to remove loose bodies from his left elbow. The Dodgers saw him excel under similar conditions last year, and he seems to be rising to the occasion once more.

"I think he's had a lot of practice in going from one mode to another," Roberts said. "Like he told me, his words: 'It's the playoffs for me, right now from the outset.' So he's showing that. The games are going to get more intense as we get into September and beyond. But love what we see."

Even without having their rotation at full strength for much of the season, the Dodgers' 3.48 ERA from their starters is tied with the Brewers for third-best in the Majors. The impending returns of Glasnow and Ohtani could turn what was already a strength into a veritable gauntlet.

Not only can the Dodgers feed off the energy of having such a rotation at their disposal, but it's also intimidating for their opponents. There's no real break in the schedule when facing L.A. as it looks to continue its winning ways.

"From our standpoint," Roberts said, "you feel like you can keep sustaining this run that we're on right now."