NEW YORK -- An evening downpour interfered with the Dodgers' best-laid plans. But it didn't wash away their chances of starting the road trip on a victorious note.
It took eight pitchers, 13 innings and nearly six hours, but the Dodgers outlasted the Mets, 7-5, in Friday's series opener at Citi Field.
After neither team scored through the first three innings of extras, Teoscar Hernández led off the 13th with a double, scoring automatic runner Will Smith with ease. Andy Pages added on with a sacrifice fly to create a little breathing room for Luis García, who held the line in the bottom of the frame.
"It's going to happen. They have a very good bullpen," Hernández said. "It's not going to be easy, but we tried. That's the best that we can do. And just go up there … fight every at-bat, try to have a good at-bat, team at-bat in that situation in extra innings, and just try to put one on the board."
It was the Dodgers' second-longest game since the automatic runner rule was put in place in 2020 -- behind only their 16-inning marathon against the Padres on Aug. 25, 2021, a 5-3 victory -- and the win came at a cost.
Los Angeles used all of its bullpen arms save for Jack Dreyer, a necessity after a one-hour, 38-minute rain delay limited Clayton Kershaw's start to two scoreless innings. It was an unwelcome, yet more manageable task when there were only seven innings to cover. But Tanner Scott, pitching for the third time in four days, could not hold on to a three-run lead in the bottom of the ninth.
“You almost sort of go in playoff mode, in the sense of trying to count outs and figure out how you can maximize your arms. And even coming into the series, we were pretty taxed," manager Dave Roberts said. "The guys did a fantastic job. And yeah, you expected four or five innings out of Clayton or whatever, quality start, and not being able to get it -- I know [Mets manager Carlos Mendoza] felt the same thing."
Both teams knew bad weather was coming, and Roberts said there was some consideration of beginning in a delay. But they thought they would be able to squeeze in more innings before the heavy rain began, rather than burning Kershaw and Mets starter Griffin Canning.
It was just Kershaw's second start of the season, as he missed the first month and a half while completing his rehab from offseason surgeries on his left knee and left toe.
"I think in hindsight, probably should have just waited to start the game for a while," Kershaw said. "Tough to have our bullpen end up covering [11] innings. But they did an amazing job. … It's a tough way to start the road trip, just depleting the bullpen like that, obviously. But the Mets had to do the same thing and they lost, so that doesn't feel near as good."
Matt Sauer and Ben Casparius were the first out of the 'pen for the Dodgers, covering three innings apiece. Then came Scott, who suffered his second blown save in his past three appearances.
Alex Vesia got the final two outs of the ninth and the first out of the 10th, then Lou Trivino, Anthony Banda and García combined to hold the Mets scoreless the rest of the way.
García pitched the final 2 1/3 innings, his longest appearance since 2017. It will be tough for the Dodgers to piece together the rest of the weekend, given all the arms they used on Friday -- but they were all in on coming out on top.
"I was hoping the guys would score the first inning that I got in," García said, "but we did it at the end, and we got the win. That was the more important thing."