LOS ANGELES – The Phillies began a killer stretch in which they face three of the top pitchers in baseball in consecutive games with a 5-0 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers on Wednesday night.
Lefty Clayton Kershaw, the Dodgers’ three-time Cy Young winner, overpowered the Phillies' hitters in pitching his first shutout of the season. He scattered eight hits, walked none and struck out 13.
Meanwhile, Phillies rookie Adam Morgan lasted just four innings.
The Phillies dropped to 29-58 overall and 11-33 on the road. Both are the worst in the majors.
Starting pitching report
Morgan (1-2) gave up six hits, including two homers, and five runs over four innings. All the runs came on homers.
Morgan did not help himself by failing to start what might have been an inning-ending double play in the third and Jimmy Rollins followed with a three-run homer.
Since June 1, Phillies starting pitchers are a majors-worst 3-19 with a 6.76 ERA. They have pitched just 185 innings over that span, the lowest in the majors.
Kershaw (6-6) raised his NL-leading strikeout total to 160.
He has allowed just two runs over 23 innings in his last three starts. The Dodgers lost the previous two by scores of 3-2 and 2-1.
Kershaw preserved his shutout with a pair of strikeouts with a man on third to end the game.
Bullpen report
Hector Neris, Jake Diekman and Justin De Fratus pitched scoreless ball after Morgan departed.
It was all Kershaw on the Dodgers’ side.
At the plate
Freddy Galvis and Domonic Brown had two hits each for the Phillies. Brown and Carlos Ruiz doubled.
A.J. Ellis smacked a two-run homer for the Dodgers in the second inning. Rollins hit his three-run homer an inning later.
Health check
Right-hander Jonathan Pettibone hit a roadblock in his recovery from shoulder surgery and will have another surgery later this month, the team announced. Pettibone first had surgery in June 2014. Wilmington surgeon Craig Morgan will perform a procedure known as an interval closure on Pettibone. Morgan had a similar surgery in January 2014.
Up next
The assignment gets no easier for the Phillies in the series finale Thursday night as they face right-hander Zack Greinke. He is 7-2 and leads the majors with a 1.48 ERA. Severino Gonzalez (3-2, 8.28) goes for the Phillies.
The Phillies face World Series MVP Madison Bumgarner in San Francisco on Friday night.