It took seven pitches for Dodgers right-hander Walker Buehler to surpass the expectations of manager Dave Roberts, who prefaced Buehler’s first major league start in 23 months on Monday night by saying, “I don’t expect to see 96-97 mph he had before [Tommy John] surgery.”
After completing his warm-up pitches with Rage Against the Machine’s “Bulls on Parade” playing over the Dodger Stadium public address system, Buehler unleashed his signature high kick and fired his first pitch, a 96 mph fastball, by Miami leadoff hitter Jazz Chisholm Jr. for the first strike.
Buehler hit 97 mph with his seventh pitch of the game, a fastball that Chisholm missed, and just for good measure, Buehler hit 97.6 mph with his eighth pitch, which was also dropped by Chisholm.
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The rest of his return from a nearly two-year absence was a bit of a mixed bag, with Buehler being tagged for three runs and five hits in the first two innings before shutting out the Marlins in the third and fourth, but there was a lot of Buehler during a 6-3 victory about the Marlins for the Dodgers to be encouraged.
Buehler needed 49 pitches to complete the first two innings, in which he gave up RBI singles to Bryan De La Cruz and Jesus Sanchez in the first and Nick Gordon’s solo home run – in which right fielder Andy Pages put on his glove before bounce over the wall – in the second.
But he struck out two of four batters in a scoreless third, Jake Burger looking at a 90 mph sinker and Josh Bell hitting a 90 mph fastball, and he hit Gordon with an 80 mph curveball and made Nick Strong hit. into a double play in a scoreless quarter, needing 28 pitches to complete his final two innings.
That ended a four-inning, 77-pitch start in which Buehler gave up three runs and six hits, struck out four and walked none before yielding to left-hander Ryan Yarbrough, who gave up one hit and struck out two in three scoreless relief innings for win the victory.
Blake Treinen, pitching for the second time in two days after being called up on Sunday, retired the team in order with a strikeout in the eighth, and left-hander Alex Vesia retired the team in order in the ninth for the save.
The first four hits of the game were home runs for the Dodgers, who won for the 12th time in 14 games and outscored opponents 89-28 and hit 25 home runs in that span.
Shohei Ohtani followed Mookie Betts’ leadoff walk in the bottom of the first with a two-run shot that traveled 441 feet to center field, his major league-leading 11th home run of the season, and Freddie Freeman followed with a solo shot for the center to give the Dodgers a 3-2 lead.
Center fielder James Outman, who entered with a .165 average, a .559 on-base-plus-slugging percentage and was mired in a three-for-28 slump, hit a two-run shot that traveled 437 feet to right center for a lead 5-3 in the second, and Teoscar Hernández’s solo shot to the left made it 6-3 in the third.
Ohtani, who was named National League player of the week on Monday, also homered in the fourth inning, stole two bases and is batting .389 (21-for-54) with seven homers and 16 RBIs in his last 13 games.
Buehler has not played in a major league game since June 10, 2022, when he felt his elbow “grab a little bit” in the third inning against the San Francisco Giants at Oracle Park. He pitched through discomfort in the fourth inning but was unable to start the fifth.
An MRI test confirmed another ulnar collateral ligament tear, and Buehler, who had Tommy John surgery in 2015, the year the Dodgers drafted him in the first round out of Vanderbilt, underwent his second ligament replacement procedure.
Thus began a nearly two-year routine that included a year of physical rehabilitation, an aborted comeback attempt last September, a delayed start to spring training, a long pitching progression and a six-game minor league rehabilitation period. which culminated in Buehler climbing the Dodger. Stadium Hill on Monday night.
“It gets boring — you know, the same boring routine, not competing and throwing games that don’t really matter,” Roberts said before the game. “For a veteran, it becomes difficult and tiring on the mind.
“But for Walker to still stay focused on preparing and seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and now we’re here… I’m really proud of him for navigating the emotions. It’s difficult, especially getting through the second one.”
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This story originally appeared on Los Angeles Times.
