Many doubted if Ned had spent his money wisely when he filled out his 2008 rotation with the expensive import from Japan but for once it looks like his scouts got this one right.
On Monday night he was just about perfect and pitched one of the best games in Dodger Stadium in years. All night long he kept the weary Braves off balance and until the vowel whacked a single into right in the eight inning they had only squared up on one ball all evening which was a line drive right at Jones.
Blake DeWitt capped off his perfect game at the plate with the defensive play of the night when he charge a bunt, and made a strong off balance throw to nail Blanco flying down the line. Later in the 9th after the perfecto had been broken up, defensive replacemant Angel Berroa made his finest play as a Dodger ranging far to his right and throwing a dart to help keep it a one hitter.
Nomar gave the Dodgers the lead with a two run home run from the shortstop position, something that hasn't happened since Furcal went down.
Something special about a one hitter but even more so when it results in your team moving into 1st place.
Per Eric Stephen from Dodger Thoughts:
Kuroda (91 game score tonight, 90 vs. the Cubs June 6) is just the 10th LA Dodger with two or more starts in a season with a 90+ game score. The last person to have a season with 2+ such starts was the aforementioned Odalis Perez in 2002.Koufax had five such seasons, and 17 games from 1960-1966.
http://www.bb-ref.com/pi/shareit/9WX8
I knew I could count on Eric to come up with the game scores and the historical significance in relative short amount of time.