PHOENIX -- Entering Tuesday night's matchup at Chase Field, only two left-handed hitters in D-backs history had homered off Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw. Then two did it in consecutive innings.
Daniel Descalso opened the scoring with a 432-foot solo home run in the second inning, making him the first D-backs lefty to take Kershaw deep since Kelly Johnson in 2011. In the third, David Peralta sent the first pitch he saw into the right-field seats to give the D-backs a 2-1 lead they wouldn't relinquish on their way to a 6-1 victory.
Descalso was 2-for-14 against Kershaw in his career prior to Tuesday. Peralta was hitless vs. the lefty ace in five at-bats.
"I think a lot of times, teams don't play their lefty guys against him for the right reason -- he's one of the best out there," Descalso said after the game. "But that's why you play the game. He's still got to go out there and make his pitches, and we got to go out and try to execute, and tonight we got the best of him."
This is just the fourth time in Kershaw's career that he's allowed two home runs in a game to lefties, with the first three being one player homering twice. The last time was Sept. 8, 2013, when former Reds slugger Jay Bruce hit two off him. The Rockies' Carlos Gonzalez hit two homers off Kershaw on May 2, 2012. And retired slugger Adam Dunn did the same with the Nationals on Aug. 6, 2010.
Including Game 1 of the 2017 National League Division Series, the D-backs have now homered six times in their last two meetings with Kershaw.
"You just don't know where [Kershaw] is coming from, what side of the plate he's going to be working on," D-backs manager Torey Lovullo said. "So when the lefties can get those types of swings and have the results that they had, it's a good night. A compliment to those guys, they work hard. They work hard for those moments.
"Daniel Descalso hits a ball over the pool. It's not something you expect, but when you see it, it doesn't surprise you because Daniel works very, very hard."
Kershaw gave up just two runs on four hits and struck out six in six innings. He picked up the loss because his teammates were kept in check by Zack Godley, who held the Dodgers to one run over seven innings.
"Kershaw is one of the best out there, so you're trying to be ready for one of his mistakes, one of his few mistakes," Descalso said.
The D-backs took advantage of two on Tuesday.
"I think lefties are still allowed to get hits off him," Descalso joked.