DETROIT -- For the fourth time in the past five games, the Dodgers came out on the wrong side of a one-run game.
Reliever Jack Dreyer could not preserve a ninth-inning tie to send Saturday's game to extras as Kevin McGonigle's walk-off single sealed a 2-1 loss for the Dodgers at Comerica Park. What was otherwise a solid afternoon for L.A.'s pitching staff was sunk by a lack of run production, a troubling trend for the team.
Seven of the Dodgers' last eight games have been decided by one run. They have lost four of those games.
On the season, the Dodgers rank fourth in the Majors with 664 runs scored. But in the second half, their offensive production has dropped off greatly, as their 157 runs scored are tied with the Giants for 20th.
As a result, L.A. has been overly reliant on run prevention at times during the past two months. That has put the onus on the Dodgers' pitching staff to work with slim margins -- and on Saturday, the arms were able to hold the line until the bottom of the ninth inning.
Blake Snell got the ball rolling by grinding through five strong innings. He only faltered in the third, when he gave up a run on a Gleyber Torres ground-rule double that put runners on second and third with nobody out. After throwing two pitches to his next batter, Hao-Yu Lee, Snell conferred with an umpire before making a break for the visitors' dugout.
Snell said later that he needed to remove a bandage on his toe that had moved out of position and was causing him to slip on the mound.
When he returned to the mound, Snell got Lee to pop out on the next pitch. He walked his next batter, then struck out a pair to strand the bases loaded.
While Snell was able to limit the damage, the stressful third inning elevated his pitch count. He reached double-digit strikeouts for the second time in four starts back from the IL, but was done after just five innings. Relievers Seth Halvorsen, Alex Vesia and Edgardo Henriquez put up zeroes behind him.
But the Dodgers only scored one run to back the arms on Freddie Freeman's RBI single in the sixth. L.A. stranded the bases loaded that inning, one of several missed opportunities for the offense.