Shohei Ohtani had three hits and scored twice, Freddie Freeman walked five times, and the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Colorado Rockies 9-5 in Denver on Monday night.
Freeman, who also singled, walked in his first four at-bats and drew an intentional pass in the eighth inning, tying a franchise record for walks in one game. Max Muncy was the last Dodger player to do it, drawing five walks on April 25, 2021.
Jason Heyward and Miguel Rojas also had three hits and James Paxton tossed seven strong innings for Los Angeles. Paxton (7-1) allowed one run on two hits and struck out a season-high eight in his longest outing of the season.
Greg Jones homered with two outs in the ninth for his first career hit and Jacob Stallings and Hunter Goodman also went deep for the Rockies.
The Dodgers scored in the first inning when Freeman walked and scored on Teoscar Hernandez’s double to right, and then added on in the second.
Rojas led off with a single and eventually scored on Ohtani’s base hit, and Will Smith tripled to the right field corner to give Los Angeles a 3-0 lead.
Ohtani batted leadoff in the Dodgers’ first game after Mookie Betts suffered a fractured hand on Sunday. Betts is expected to return at some point this season.
Stallings led off the bottom of the second with his fourth home run of the season to put Colorado on the board.
Rockies starter Cal Quantrill (6-5) settled down after the second to pitch five innings. He allowed three runs on seven hits to keep his team in the game, but the Dodgers extended their lead against reliever Geoff Hartlieb in the seventh.
Heyward singled and scored on a double by Rojas and Cavan Biggio drove in Rojas with a single up the middle to make it 5-1. Hartlieb avoided more damage when Gavin Lux grounded into a double play to end the inning.
Heyward knocked in a pair of runs with a bases-loaded single in the eighth. Biggio scored on Lux’s double in the ninth before Lux scored on a sacrifice fly to round out the Dodgers’ scoring.
Colorado scored four times with two outs in the ninth, capped by Goodman’s two-run blast, his fifth of the season.
