PHOENIX — Nine Dodgers stood frozen in disbelief.
Around them, 40,000-plus people at Chase Field erupted in cheers.
Facing elimination in Game 3 of the National League Division Series on Wednesday night, their backs against the wall following two home losses to start the postseason, the Dodgers crumbled for good in pitiful and, given their season-long pitching problems, predictable fashion.
In a jarring six-batter stretch during the bottom of the third, starting pitcher Lance Lynn gave up four solo home runs, the most in an inning in MLB postseason history.
What had been a scoreless contest suddenly turned into a four-run deficit.
Their latest playoff failure might be the worst one of them all, a three-game beatdown at the hands of the underdog Arizona Diamondbacks.
And as the last long ball sailed out of the yard — a 109-mph laser from Arizona’s Gabriel Moreno, one pitch after he had another homer negated when the umpires agreed the ball had gone foul — the Dodgers’ fielders stood motionless around the diamond, seemingly resigned to an inevitable fate.
After another 100-win campaign, another division title and another year of hoping to reverse their checkered October history, the Dodgers’ 2023 season instead ended in a familiar fizzle, their 4-2 loss Wednesday completing a three-game sweep at the hands of the sixth-seeded Diamondbacks.
“They outplayed us,†manager Dave Roberts said of the Diamondbacks, who finished 16 games behind the Dodgers in the NL West standings. “There’s no other spin to it.â€
The series marked the Dodgers’ first time being swept in the playoffs since the 2006 NLDS against the New York Mets.
It extended their postseason losing streak to six games, dating back to last year’s NLDS elimination by the San Diego Padres, the second-longest October skid in franchise history.
Most of all, it exposed all the weak spots of the Dodgers’ reshaped 2023 roster — with a patchwork pitching plan collapsing under the weight of three bad starts, and a top-heavy offense unable to generate any impactful response.
“They were definitely the team that was getting the hits. They were the team that was making the pitches. They were making the plays,†third baseman Max Muncy said. “Just all across the board, they just dominated us, really. We just didn’t give ourself a chance at all.â€
The starting pitching was the biggest problem. In Game 1, Clayton Kershaw gave up six runs in perhaps the worst — and, as he contemplates retirement this offseason, potentially the last — start of his career. In Game 2, Bobby Miller surrendered three runs in his own poor first inning.
In Game 3, the issue was further compounded by Lynn, the bargain-bin trade deadline acquisition who led the majors with 44 homers allowed in the regular season.
Arizona’s No. 9 hitter, Geraldo Perdomo, clubbed a center-cut fastball to right for a leadoff blast. Two batters later, Ketel Marte turned on an inside cutter for a 428-foot drive to right.
That stirred the Dodgers bullpen — the team’s lone bright spot of the series — with left-handed reliever Caleb Ferguson starting to get loose.
Roberts, however, decided to stick with Lynn through the right-handed heart of Arizona’s lineup, especially after his veteran starter picked up a second out following Marte’s homer.
“You’ve got two outs and a low-pitch count … you’ve got to be able to navigate it,†said Roberts, who was also wary of deploying his top relievers as aggressively as he did in Game 2, knowing the Dodgers needed three straight wins to come back in the series.
“I try not to be reactionary and get ahead of things,†Roberts added. “I just can’t predict the future.â€
Instead, the dizzying sequence that followed left the Dodgers all but dead.
In back-to-back at-bats, Christian Walker and Moreno both took Lynn deep. Walker pounced on an elevated cutter. Moreno then provided some long-ball dramatics, hitting one drive just foul of the right-field pole (it was initially ruled a home run, until the umpires gathered and corrected the call) before hammering the next pitch out to deep center.
“I got behind in counts and they made me pay,†said Lynn, whose performance completed a series in which the Dodgers’ rotation gave up 13 runs and collected just 14 outs. “That’s what they’ve been doing all series.â€
Suddenly down 4-0 and facing a raucous home-town crowd — there were surprisingly few pockets of blue in the Diamondbacks’ first playoff home game in six years — the Dodgers never recovered.
Their superstar duo of Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman again disappeared, going hitless in eight total at-bats to finish the series a combined one for 21.
A pregame shake-up to the lineup didn’t help much, either, with designated hitter J.D. Martinez going 0 for 4 after being bumped up to the No. 3 spot.
“It’s hard to put into words right now,†Freeman said. “A lot of us didn’t play the way we wanted to.â€
Even with the Diamondbacks starting rookie Brandon Pfaadt on the mound, and the 24-year-old right-hander serving up fastballs over the heart of the plate, the Dodgers couldn’t capitalize in 4 1/3 scoreless innings against him. They managed just six runs in the three games.
“I’m sure you guys can go back and look at balls in the strike zone and what they did [to] them, and balls in the strike zone and what we did with them,†Roberts said. “When you get balls to hit and slug, the team that does it more is likely going to win.â€
The Dodgers did mount a brief rally in the seventh, stringing together four straight singles — including RBI hits from Chris Taylor and Kiké Hernández, who started in place of rookie James Outman — to cut the Arizona lead in half.
That was as close as they got.
After a leadoff walk by pinch-hitter Kolten Wong in the eighth, Betts and Freeman struck out chasing pitches out of the zone. Martinez flied out to center.
Then in the ninth, a last-gasp drive from Chris Taylor died at the warning track in right-center, cementing the Dodgers’ third elimination in the NLDS in the last five years.
“When you get to this late in the season, usually the hot team wins,†Taylor said. “They’re playing their best baseball they’ve played all year, I think. And we were probably playing our worst baseball we’ve played all year.â€
The postgame scene was all too futile, and much too familiar.
Players on the Arizona Diamondbacks celebrate on the field and in the pool at Chase Field after defeating the Dodgers in the NLDS on Wednesday night. (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
With red eyes and a shaky voice, Roberts struggled to reconcile yet another October disappointment, replaying the same sound bites that have accompanied other early exits in recent years.
“The regular season, I think we do a great job,†Roberts said. “But the last couple of postseasons it just hasn’t gone well for us. So I’ve got to figure it out.â€
In hushed tones around a somber clubhouse, his players also struggled to find the right words, unable to explain how a team so good in the summer could fall so flat in the fall.
“In the postseason, man, you gotta play well,†said Betts, who is three for his last 38 in the playoffs dating back to 2021. “We have not. You can point to a million different things, but at the end of the day, you have to play well.â€
Once again, these Dodgers did not, retreating quietly to the clubhouse as the Diamondbacks deliriously celebrated around them.
They’d come up short in October.
They’d let another long winter arrive too soon.
“Hurt, disappointed, frustrated,†Hernández said. “And a little bit embarrassed.â€
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