by STEVE HAN
Hyun-Jin Ryu pitched as well as he could after missing three weeks due to a shoulder injury, but the Los Angeles Dodgers failed to produce the runs they needed and lost 3-1 to the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 3 of the National League Division Series. The Dodgers, now down 2-1 in the series, are one loss away from getting eliminated by the Cardinals in the playoffs for two straight seasons.
Making his third career postseason start, Ryu gave up just five hits and one run in six strong innings as he struck out four. He gave up the solitary run in the third inning to Matt Carpenter who hit a solo home run to give the Cardinals the lead. Hanley Ramirez tied the game for the Dodgers in the sixth inning with a two-out single to right field that scored Yasiel Puig who tripled to lead off the inning.
Dodgers manager Don Mattingly lifted Ryu for a pinch hitter in the top of the seventh inning and replaced him with Scott Elbert. The inexperienced reliever, who played most of this season in the minor leagues where he combined for an abysmal 5.85 earned run average, immediately gave up three hits, including a two run homer to Kolten Wong that gave the Cardinals the lead for good.
“I definitely could have kept on pitching,” said Ryu, after throwing just 94 pitches in the game. “But the manager makes the decision that’s best for the team.”
Mattingly explained that he replaced Ryu with Elbert for precautionary reasons as he had just returned from an injury. He added that Elbert, the left hander, was expected to stifle the Cardinals’ left handed batters, but admitted that his experiment failed.
“Pretty amazing that a guy can be off that long and be that sharp,” Mattingly said of Ryu. “Scotty [Elbert] is a lefty that gives us some angle. We wanted to give him a different look. We knew the Cardinals were a team with some good left handed hitters, and we wanted to try to be able to neutralize them. Obviously to this point we have not been able to.”
The Dodgers will look to extend the series in today’s Game 4 (5 p.m. ET) by starting Clayton Kershaw on short rest even after the ace’s meltdown in Game 1 in which he was shelled for eight runs. If the Dodgers win, the best-of-five series returns to Los Angeles for Game 5 on Thursday.
