When Alex Wood last faced the Atlanta Braves, he had a night to forget. On June 9 at Dodger Stadium, he allowed four runs (two earned) in 4.2 innings and fell to 1-5 on the season.
Following that outing, Wood alluded to that stretch of the season being the most difficult of his career. He’s yet to suffer a loss in eight starts since that point, with the Dodgers going 6-2 in those games.
Their most-recent victory came Saturday night, when Wood largely shut down his former teammates at SunTrust Park. He did issue four walks and hit a batter, but still limited Atlanta to just one hit over 5.2 shutout innings.
J.T. Chargois inherited two runners and struck out Tyler Flowers to end the sixth, preserving Wood’s scoreless outing.
Following the win, Wood confirmed he was in a groove for much of the night, per Andy McCullough of the L.A. Times:
“It was good tonight,” Wood said. “I thought we had a really good game plan, and I had all three [pitches] working for the most part. I felt pretty good.”
Although he only allowed a one-out double to Charlie Culberson in the first inning, the free passes handed out meant Wood faced multiple situations where traffic was on the bases. He effectively kept the ball down to induce key double plays in the third and fourth innings.
On the season the southpaw is now 7-5 with a 3.68 ERA. His current stretch has quieted, temporarily at least, talk of potentially shifting Wood to the bullpen because the Dodgers have a surplus of starting pitchers.
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