Kemp Re-Aggravates Hamstring, Dodgers Fall Flat Again

The misery continued for the Dodgers against the Milwaukee Brewers.

It was bad enough they lost 6-3. It was bad enough they are on their first three-game losing streak of the season. But the knockout blow perhaps came in the first inning when Matt Kemp left the game after re-aggravating his left hamstring.

"It's definitely frustrating," Kemp said.

And it happened when things were great for the Dodgers.

With two outs Brewers' starting pitcher Yovani Gallardo wanted nothing to do with Kemp, walking him on four pitches. Andre Ethier followed up with a double that was bobbled a bit by centerfielder Carlos Gomez allowing Kemp to score for the quick 1-0 lead. No error was charged to Gomez on the play.

However as Kemp rounded third base, he grimaced and pulled up a little as he was heading to the plate.

"I don't know what happened," Kemp said. "I was pretty much close to third base. I just felt it."

Dodgers' manager Don Mattingly knew he had to pull Kemp.

"When he came around going into third, it didn't look right to me," Mattingly said.

After Mattingly pulled Kemp, Kemp went through a tantrum, breaking a bat and knocking things over.

"Anytime I'm frustrated it's because I'm not playing in the game," Kemp explained. "It's not because me being mad at Donnie B. He has a job to do and that's to protect his players. He can't throw me out there when I'm hurt. That's just out of frustration at being hurt. I want to be out there with my team."

That took the sails out of the 25,509 announced crowd at Dodger Stadium that not even the announcement and video highlights of the Kings' Game 1 victory could save.

Dodgers' starter Clayton Kershaw had a rough night out against the Brewers. Although his earned run average was 8.74 at Dodger Stadium against the Brewers, he hadn't faced them at home since 2010.

His first rough patch came in the fourth inning when a Carlos Gomez single scored two runs. The Brewers worked the count tonight driving his pitch count to over 100 after five innings.

As Kershaw summarized: "I threw a lot of pitches. I couldn't put anybody away. They had really good at-bats all night. Just a rough night."

The end for Kershaw came when he gave up the RBI single to Gallardo that gave the Brewers the 4-1 lead. Javy Guerra came on in relief and gave up back-to-back singles that plated another run that was charged to Kershaw.

Even though the Dodgers rallied for two runs in the seventh inning, they grounded into double plays in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings killing any possibility of scoring any further.

As Mattingly noted about the game after Kemp left, "Today's game it felt a little bit flat. But we're in a position where we're going to need to step up and play."

And it doesn't get any easier. The Dodgers face Zack Greinke on Thursday and head on a nine-game roadtrip to Colorado, Philadelphia and Seattle.

"We're going to have to regroup again," Mattingly said. "It's a little bit of a downer because you battled through that two-week period. You get him back and you're looking forward to getting closer to full strength. Then you take another shot. I think that's a little bit of a blow.

"But we're going to need to regroup at this point. Obviously none of us want to go through this and want to do it like this. But at this point there is not going to be another choice if Matt's on the DL which looks like it's a pretty good chance."

LA Kings defeat New Jersey Devils 2-1 (OT). Anze Kopitar's overtime deke of Martin Brodeur gave the Kings their first Stanley Cup Finals win since 1993.

New York Yankees defeat LA Angels 6-5. Albert Pujols went 2-for-4 with a walk raising his batting average to .243.

TONIGHT'S ACTION
Milwaukee Brewers at LA Dodgers. 7:10 p.m. Prime Ticket, AM 570 KLAC.