Yoshinobu Yamamoto falters against Ceddanne Rafaela and Red Sox in Dodgers’ loss

Dodgers right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s start Saturday would have been dominant if it weren’t for Red Sox center fielder Ceddanne Rafaela.

Rafaela’s pair of home runs accounted for most of Boston’s damage against Yamamoto in the Dodgers’ 3-2 loss. Yamamoto held the Red Sox to three runs and four hits through eight innings.

The Dodgers dropped the series to the Red Sox, needing a win Sunday to avoid a sweep.

Rafaela jumped all over the first pitch he saw from Yamamoto in the first inning, a splitter, according to Statcast, that drifted up and in. He drove it into the left-field stands.

Two innings later, Yamamoto held off Rafaela for longer. But Rafaela battled back from a 0-2 count. On the fourth pitch of the at-bat, Yamamoto turned to his splitter for the first time, barely clipping the inside edge of the strike zone. Rafaela turned on it and sent a towering solo homer three rows deep in left-center field.

It was the second multi-homer game of Rafaela’s career.

It wasn’t until Yamamoto’s third time through the order that he finally set down Rafaela, who had the Red Sox’s only hits at that point.

Yamamoto went with a first-pitch fastball up and in. Rafaela was a little late to it but still made hard contact, sending the opposite-field fly out to the warning track.

In the eighth, Yamamoto gave up a leadoff ground-rule double to Andruw Monasterio. He made it to third on Jarren Duran’s push-bunt single and scored the go-ahead run when Connor Wong grounded into a double play.

The Dodgers got a boost early from Teoscar Hernández on a two-run home run in the second inning. But they failed to score again after leaving seven runners stranded.

Bullpen shuffle

Before the game, the Dodgers put reliever Will Klein on the 15-day injured list with discomfort in his right elbow.

Klein had a 2.29 ERA one week into July. But over his last six appearances, he has surrendered 13 runs, including eight earned runs (11.37 ERA).

“We’re still trying to dig into it,” Roberts said Friday after Klein gave up three runs (one earned run) to the Red Sox in 1⅓ innings. “I thought there were some good fastball throws in there tonight, but the secondary stuff, that’s kind of what’s getting him. The sweeper is not a strike, he’s not getting chase from it. The curveball has a different shape to it than it did last year. So I don’t know if it’s an arm thing, a mechanics thing, but that’s something we’re trying to dig in on.”

Klein is the second right-handed reliever the Dodgers have put on the IL in as many days, joining Brock Stewart. And MRI scan Saturday showed tendinitis in Stewart’s right shoulder.

He felt some discomfort in his shoulder, the same one he had surgically cleaned up in September, since last Saturday in New York, Stewart said. But until then, it hadn’t bothered him all season, minor-league rehab stints included.

“It’s almost embarrassing,” said Stewart, who began the season on the IL while recovering from shoulder surgery and had another IL stint when he aggravated a bone spur in his left foot. “I’d like to think that I do everything in my power to stay healthy and help out. I know I’m proud of the work I put in each day, and that’s all I can really control. Other than that, I can’t really control how my arm reacts. Just frustrating, especially after last year having it cleaned up.”

The Dodgers also designated left-hander Cole Irvin for assignment on Saturday. Irvin covered six innings and yielded six runs in the Dodgers’ pseudo-bullpen game Saturday, his first major-league appearance since 2024.

To replace Irvin and Klein, the Dodgers recalled right-handed relievers Kyle Hurt and Wyatt Mills.