Dustin May stifles Rockies as Dodgers get back on track

LOS ANGELES — Dustin May was about to throw a warm-up pitch before the second inning on Monday night when a bumblebee flew under the bill of his cap and right into his eye, causing the Dodgers pitcher to abort his windup and hop off the mound as he swatted the bug away.

May shooed away the Colorado Rockies in similar fashion, the lanky right-hander continuing his early season dominance by allowing one run and three hits in six innings of a 5-3 Dodgers victory before a sellout crowd of 52,693 in Chavez Ravine.

The top four batters in the Dodgers order – Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman and Will Smith – combined to go 9 for 17 with two home runs, five runs and five RBIs, as the Dodgers snapped a two-game losing streak.

Reliever Kirby Yates escaped a two-on, two-out jam in the eighth by getting Michael Toglia to ground to first, and left-hander Tanner Scott escaped a first-and-third, one-out jam in the ninth by striking out Sean Bouchard and getting Jacob Stallings to ground to second for his fifth save.

May, mixing his 94 mph sinker and 95 mph four-seam fastball with his 85 mph sweeper, struck out seven, walked none and needed only 76 pitches – 52 of them strikes – to complete six innings.

He induced 14 swinging strikes and allowed one runner to reach second base before Colorado nicked him for a run in the sixth, the only blemish on his first big-league win since May 6, 2023.

“With Dustin, there’s always been a confidence in himself, but [the difference is] the efficiency of the pitches, the flooding the strike zone, the ability to strike the secondary pitches and get swing and miss when he needs it,” Manager Dave Roberts said.

“I think his confidence is really building. It’s sustainable. I think it’s real. He’s understanding how to get major league hitters out, left and right. … Certainly, this was another stepping stone for him.”

May, who underwent his second Tommy John surgery in 2023 and suffered a life-threatening esophagus tear when a piece of lettuce from a salad got lodged in his throat last summer, has allowed two earned runs and 11 hits, struck out 14 and walked six in 17 innings of his first three starts.

“It’s huge just to be able to go out and pitch,” May said. “Even if it wasn’t good, it would be huge for me because I haven’t been able to do it for so long, and it almost got taken away. Being able to contribute and be kind of decent is huge.”

The run support for May wasn’t as huge as it could have been – the Dodgers left the bases loaded in the fifth and sixth innings, went 2 for 10 with runners in scoring position, and Ohtani just missed hitting two more home runs – but it was an improvement over the last 10 days.

The Dodgers had lost three straight series and were 3-6 since their 8-0 start, mustering five runs and scoring in just three of the 26 innings they came to bat in a three-game weekend series against the Chicago Cubs.

“I liked tonight,” Roberts said. “I thought we built innings. We created stress. … We took our walks. A lot of traffic. Really got to the starter.”

The Dodgers wasted no time teeing off on Rockies right-hander Antonio Senzatela, who was 0-2 with a 5.14 ERA in his first three starts and yielded a .415 batting average and 1.026 OPS in 14 innings.

Ohtani opened the bottom of the first with a single to right, and Betts lined a two-run home run, his fourth of the season, to left field for a 2-0 lead. They pushed the lead to 3-0 in the third when Ohtani obliterated a 98 mph fastball up in the zone, sending a 112 mph drive 408 feet over the center-field wall for his fifth homer of the season.

The Dodgers tacked on in the fifth, Betts leading off with a double to left, taking third on Freeman’s groundout to first and scoring on Smith’s RBI single through a drawn-in infield for a 4-0 lead.

The Rockies, who were shut out three times in San Diego over the weekend, scored their first run since Thursday when Nick Martini reached on a two-out infield single off the glove of third baseman Max Muncy and scored on Kyle Farmer’s RBI double to make it 4-1 in the sixth.

The Dodgers countered with a run in the bottom of the sixth with the help of Colorado second baseman Adael Amador, who was unable to get Freeman’s potential inning-ending double-play grounder out of his glove for an error, allowing the Dodgers to load the bases. Smith followed with a sacrifice fly to left for a 5-1 lead.

“We all know we’ve been struggling,” Betts said. “Everybody is trying to be the guy to get us out of it, but I think we have to kind of go the opposite way and stop trying so hard and just kind of let it happen.

“It’s a long season, and the more you try, try, try, it’s like the further it gets away from you. The more you chase it, it just keeps running away. So when you just let things happen, just play the game like you always do, good things tend to happen.”