In Thursday’s series finale against the Dodgers, the Indians’ offense broke out for 15 hits thanks in large part to Lonnie Chisenhall’s five RBIs and Edwin Encarnacion’s career-high four runs scored. Both homered to back starter Josh Tomlin and lead the Indians to a 12-5 victory over the Dodgers at Progressive Field.
The Tribe’s offense set the tone early, scoring five runs in the first two innings off Dodgers starter Rich Hill. Encarnacion capped off the second with his 13th homer of the season, and Chisenhall closed the book on Hill in the fifth with a pinch-hit, three-run home run off reliever Ross Stripling. Chisenhall added a two-run single in the sixth, Jose Ramirez and Roberto Perez each finished with two RBIs and Erik Gonzalez hit his first career home run in the seventh.
“I think we had [Hill] up over 60 [pitches] after two,” Indians manager Terry Francona said. “Then he kind of started throwing like he can for a couple innings. But then we added on and we kept after him. We took our walks, we laid off the breaking ball that can be so devastating. I thought we played with a ton of energy today.”
Tomlin picked up his fourth win of the season after striking out seven in over five-plus innings of work. The right-hander allowed four runs on seven hits and two walks.
“I felt pretty good,” Tomlin said. “I felt like it was a little bit of work today, those guys made you get in the zone. A lot of 3-2, 2-2 counts. So it was a pretty tough day, but at the end of the day we won and we were able to keep the team in the game long enough for the offense to explode, and they did a great job.”
For the Dodgers, Chris Taylor hit a two-run homer, Cody Bellinger clubbed his 18th homer and Yasiel Puig added an RBI double. With his solo shot, Bellinger has gone deep six times in his last five games. But the offense was not enough, ending their season-long six-game winning streak.
Hill was handed his third loss of the season after he was pulled in the fifth. The left-hander gave up seven runs on eight hits, two walks and two hit batters in four-plus innings. Hill has yet to pitch into the sixth inning in any of his eight starts this season.
“They did a good job putting the bat on the ball and putting the ball in play,” Hill said. “They had a few ground balls get through in the first inning. But at the end of the day, I’m not helping the team putting outings together like this.”
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