Dodgers keep slugging in series-clincher over Braves and Newcomb

Sean Newcomb was his homerless and winning streaks both snapped in Sunday’s 7-2 loss at Dodger Stadium. (Video by David O’Brien)

Southern California is a great place to visit, but the Braves would probably just as soon not play there.

They watched three more Dodger home runs sail over the fences at venerable Dodger Stadium on a sunny Sunday in a 7-2 Braves loss -- two of those homers against Sean Newcomb, who hadn’t allowed a homer since late April.

That clinched the series for the Dodgers and left the Braves with a 2-4 record and series defeats at San Diego and Los Angeles on a trip that ended Sunday.

Ozzie Albies and Freddie Freeman hit home runs off Dodgers starter Ross Stripling, who allowed only three homers all season before Sunday. But Newcomb gave up five runs and seven hits in 5-1/3 innings as the Braves left-hander ended a pair of impressive streaks including his 44-inning homerless streak.

“I liked our chances, we were kind of getting to Stripling a little bit,” said manager Brian Snitker, whose Braves cut the lead to 3-2 with the Albies and Freeman homers in the fourht inning. “(Newcomb) battled his way through; you’re not going to be perfect all the time. Considering a hot club that he’s facing, and here. ...”

The Braves last won a series at Dodger Stadium in April 2012 and have dropped 14 of their past 18 games there including two games in the 2013 division series.

They’ve lost 16 of their past 19 games at San Diego.

Newcomb gave up a pair of homers and reliever Luiz Gohara allowed another one as the Dodgers posted their eighth multi-homer outburst in nine June games and raised their majors-leading total to a stunning 26 homers for the month. No other team had more than 16 before Sunday.

The Dodgers hit nine homers in the three-game series including a season-high five in Friday’s opener.

Stripling (5-1) worked 6-2/3 innings and allowed only two hits other than the solo homers.

Newcomb faced six batters in the first two innings before Logan Forsythe led off the third with a first-pitch homer. The Dodgers batted around in the three-run inning.

“Started off solid, made a couple of just stupid pitches in that (third) inning, one that Forsythe hit out,” Newcomb said. “I wasn’t making my pitches that inning, wasn’t making pitches I was supposed to, just kind of leaving them there for them to hit and mixing in some uncompetitive ones. It kind of all happened pretty fast in that inning.”

The loss for Newcomb (7-2) snapped his winning streak of seven consecutive decisions over 11 starts, the longest by a Braves starter since Mike Minor won seven straight between late August 2012 and early April 2013.

The last Braves starter with a streak as long in a single season was Tim Hudson, who won seven consecutive decisions in 2012 from July 6 through Aug. 26.

Newcomb was 7-0 with a 1.96 ERA during his streak, which began in his second start after he gave up five earned runs in 4-1/3 innings in an April 2 loss to the Nationals in his season debut. He’s allowed more than two earned runs just three times in 12 starts since including two in just over two week, Sunday’s outing coming three starts after the Massachusetts native allowed three earned runs in three innings of a May 26 homecoming start at Boston.

Newcomb’s homerless streak was the longest active streak by a major league starter and surpassed by one inning a 43-inning homerless streak that Kris Medlen had over his final six starts in 2013, the last of more than 40 innings by a Braves starter until Newcomb.

After Forsythe’s homer, Austin Barnes followed with a single and Stripling sacrificed the runner over before Chris Taylor bounced a comebacker that went off Newcomb’s glove and was ruled a hit. Max Muncy followed with a walk to load the bases before consecutive RBI singles from Matt Kemp and Kike Hernandez pushed the lead to 3-0.

Newcomb avoided more damage in the inning by striking out Yasiel Puig and Cody Bellinger consecutively with bases loaded. Puig showed his frustration by breaking his bat over his knee as he left the batter’s box ala Bo Jackson from a few decades ago, when it was more impressive as bat handles weren’t nearly as thin as now.

That began stretch of six consecutive batters retired by Newcomb before Muncy’s one-out solo homer in the fifth, which pushed the Dodgers’ lead back to 4-2 after the Braves’ two-homer fourth inning.

“It wasn’t his best day command-wise and everything,” Braves catcher Tyler Flowers said. “Like with everybody, the majority of their starts they’re not going to be feeling great, so what can you do in those to help you get through them? He did a good job trying to stay with his curveball, getting it in there for strikes and getting some swings. We used a few sliders, mixed in some good change-ups in fastball counts. Really, if you look back I think there were only a couple of hard-hit balls. Couple of other ones, bad luck, balls finding holes. It happens in this game.

“All in all, I think he can take a lot of positives away from it.”

Newcomb had allowed only three homers all season in 68 2/3 innings before Sunday, when he gave up more than one homer for the first time this season and the third time in 32 career starts.

Stripling required just 24 pitches to retire the Braves in order in first three innings but needed 33 pitches to get three outs in the fourth.

Albies led off the fourth inning with a homer on a full-count fastball in the eighth pitch of his at-bat, and Freeman followed two batters later with his 12th homer – on a 2-2 slider that was the seventh pitch of the at-bat -- to cut the lead to 3-2.

That gave the Braves two homers in a span of three batters against a pitcher who had allowed three homers all season and just one in six starts since moving to the rotation full-time.

Albies' homer was his 15th of the season and first since May 22. He was 12-for-74 (.162) with four RBIs during his 17-game homerless drought. Freeman’s homer was his third in a torrid five-game stretch in which he’s 10-for-21 with six extra-base hits.

Muncy’s solo homer in the fifth inning was the Dodger third baseman’s third in the three-game series and his ninth home run in 20 hits over his past 19 games.

Stripling, since moving to the regular rotation, was 4-0 with a 1.06 ERA and one homer allowed in six starts before Sunday, with 47 strikeouts and four walks in 34 innings over that span. He had six strikeouts without a walk Sunday.