While San Francisco Giants starter Madison Bumgarner will be on the mound Tuesday to face the Los Angeles Dodgers, his usual foil – Clayton Kershaw – is not quite ready to make it a duel of aces.
Kershaw did not start for the Dodgers on Opening Day last week for the first time since 2010 because of shoulder inflammation, but he will pitch Thursday for Triple-A Oklahoma City in a rehab outing.
On Tuesday at Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles will send left-hander Hyun-Jin Ryu back to the mound for his second outing. Ryu (1-0) gave up one run on four hits over six innings Thursday as the Dodgers defeated the Arizona Diamondbacks 12-5 to start the season.
Bumgarner (0-1) also kicked off the season for his team, giving up two runs over seven innings with nine strikeouts, but the Giants fell 2-0 to the San Diego Padres.
With Bumgarner’s fifth Opening Day start for the Giants behind him, he will continue to work on what could be his final season in San Francisco. At 29, Bumgarner is in the final season of his contract for a Giants organization that could be willing to make major changes as it looks to return to prominence.
Among the many areas where Bumgarner has thrived, pitching against the Dodgers is one of them. He has a 2.66 career ERA against Los Angeles over 202 2/3 innings but was 0-2 against the Dodgers in three starts last year with a 4.00 ERA.
Bumgarner needs two strikeouts for 200 against the Dodgers in his career.
“I felt really good,” Bumgarner said after Thursday’s game. “Command was the biggest thing. My stuff was good, but the command of stuff was pretty much there the whole game. It didn’t seem like there was a whole lot of misses that were bad misses. Everything was in the general vicinity of where I wanted to go, with the exception of a couple. But I felt pretty good about it.”
It will make Tuesday’s matchup against the Dodgers an intriguing one. Los Angeles dropped 42 runs on the Diamondbacks in the season-opening four-game series, the most runs in the first four games since the Milwaukee Brewers scored 49 in their opening four games of 1978.
In Monday’s first matchup between the rivals, the Dodgers were held in check during a 4-2 Giants victory, although Chris Taylor and Alex Verdugo did hit their first home runs of the season.
The Dodgers have hit 16 home runs already this season, tied with the Seattle Mariners for most in baseball.
“We got a fun team,” said the Dodgers’ Max Muncy, who has a home run and drove in the game-winning run Sunday. “Everyone loves being here.”
Ryu, who has struggled with a bevy of injuries over the previous three years from shoulder to elbow, hip, foot and groin, faced the Giants three times last year going 1-0 with a 1.53 ERA over 17 2/3 innings. In 15 career starts against the Giants, he is 5-6 with a 2.98 ERA over 81 2/3 innings.
The Giants are now 4-1 over their last five games at Dodger Stadium. The Dodgers have home runs in nine consecutive games going back to last season.
