Yoshinobu Yamamoto struggles while the giants beat the dodgers to move in Tie at the top of NL West

Billing could not have been greater. Dodgers vs giants. Yoshinobu Yamamoto against Logan Webb. One of the oldest rivalries in the game, opposing what was supposed to be two of the best launchers in the game.

Friday evening, at the Dodger Stadium, however, only one right -handed AS appeared.

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Webb did its thing, abandoning two tracks on seven spectacular rounds.

In front of him, Yamamoto was not a match, wading in the beginning of five rounds and 4 ⅔ in the 6-2 defeat of the Dodgers-one which left the rivals at the top of the West National League with records of 41-29 identical after their first meeting of the season.

The evening was a study on the excellence of pitching (or, in the case of Yamamoto, a lack of it); To remind you that, as well as Yamamoto has become in his second season of major league, there are levels to his talent which he has not yet reached.

Find out more: ‘It is 1 of 5.’ How Ben Casparius made his way in the starting rotation of the dodgers

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“There was absolutely no location with which I was satisfied,” Yamamoto said in Japanese.

“I think things are good,” added manager Dave Roberts. “I think he was a little too good.”

Indeed, where webb obtained soft contact and fast outings, needing only 98 locations to finish its seventh outing in seven -rounds of the season, Yamamoto worked by the counting of strikers and the long strikers, emitting a career in career of five walks while finding the striking area on only 56 of its 102 locations.

When webb limited traffic and escaped rare problems, only abandoning two strokes while walking three strikers, Yamamoto worked through self-inflicted jams; No worse than when he traveled the bases loaded in the third, then abandoned a great slam destroyed in Casey Schmitt.

“The way I abandoned the races was really bad,” said Yamamoto, who was tearing his glove from disgust, and almost threw it on the ground, while Schmitt’s journey disappeared beyond the fence of the left field.

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“I tried to regain my rhythm and get better. I tried to turn the page emotionally. But I couldn’t adapt. I did not put up well until the end. ”

Yamamoto actually settled after the Grand Colem, giving way no other race while entering the fifth round.

But, where webb played the role of the AS of the staff of a rival team, lowering its average achieved to 2.58 (fifth best of the national league), Yamamoto failed in a way which has become uncomfortably familiar from the end, its tiny ERA having almost tripled in the last month.

During his first seven departures, Yamamoto was 4-2 with an MPM of 0.90, a whip of 0.925 and had only one match in which he abandoned two deserved points.

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“Right now, he is launching as the best launcher in the world,” said receiver Will Smith on May 2, after Yamamoto turned six sleeves of money laundering against the Braves of Atlanta.

But since then, Yamamoto has been on a entirely different and much less reliable planet.

During his last seven outings, the 26-year-old Japanese star has a 2-3 sheet with a 4.46 MPM. During this period, he has more than five rounds (two) than seven complete heats (one). He abandoned three or over four times, and five times more than five points. And with his season time at 2.64, he tended in the wrong direction.

“A game like this, I just need to focus, learn things and turn something into a positive,” said Yamamoto. “And then prepare for the next outing.”

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The most coherent problem during the Yamamoto crisis: poor command.

Even with a tight strike area of ​​the Adam Beck plate referee on Friday, Yamamoto blamed his bad execution as the main factor. He traveled 17 strikers in his last 38 heats. Its usual punctual control suddenly disappeared.

This is a problem that Roberts explains that the general slowdown of Yamamoto. And when he did not lead to free passes, he placed the launcher behind the user -friendly counts of the strikers – as when Willy Adames opened the scoring on Friday by taking ahead of 2 and 0 and by hitting a quick ball at the bottom of the average for a solo run -home.

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“I think it is correctable in the sense of, I think it’s just an intentional part,” said Roberts. “It’s not like things take turns [on him]. “”

Another potential factor in Yamamoto’s difficulties: it was recently forced to rest between departures.

During his first seven departures, Yamamoto launched at least six days of rest – reflecting the calendar once a week he had in Japan.

Since then, however, each of its outings has taken five -day shorter breaks.

Yamamoto minimized this factor several times, saying that he had noticed any physical reduction in his new schedule. Roberts noted how last year, Yamamoto had in fact slightly better figures over five days of rest (2.97 ERA in 11 departures) than six (3.07 ERA in seven departures).

However, while the Dodgers have sailed around their nyegers nuns staff, the dropout of Yamamoto came at a particularly bad time. Not only were the dodgers in the middle of an exhausting game of their schedule in the last month, but they watched the advance of the three -game division that they held at the end of May at only 13 days after June.

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“It’s really essential,” said Roberts about this current house house, in particular, with the third place in San Diego Padres who is in town for a four game set next week after the Giants depart. “You see the calendar, you see the opponents, you see where your ball club is, and you just want to continue rushing and playing a good baseball.”

Dodgers programming, of course, did not help on this front either on Friday.

After marked on a Andy Pages Fly Pages sacrifice in the second, when a return home beaten Smith, but was abandoned by the receiver of the Giants Andrew Knizner while he was trying to apply a label, the only other production of the team against Webb came via Teoscar Hernández, who aligned the first blow of the Dodgers in the Seventh.

Until then, however, webb had already put the game on the ice, becoming the last launcher leaving this month to manage the star range of the Dodgers (the opposing starters have an MPM of 2.43 against the Dodgers in June and have an average of almost six rounds per departure).

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“I was thinking early, it was going to be a tight match, and we could have seen it,” said Roberts. “But I think that once they hit the Grand Slam, so it just gave him much more margin, right there, and he was just on the attack.”

Which, once again, made the Yamamoto clunker even more expensive; By magnifying the problems he faces a talented launcher that the team desperately needs to start playing like an ace again.

Roberts said: “It was simply not as effective as necessary to be tonight.”

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.