Is Kershaw already declining?

Wonderkid Clayton Kershaw was klobbered tonight under an assault of walks, HBP, fly ball doubles, and one massive home run by Prince. He ended up giving up seven earned runs in the second inning and had to rely on Ramon Ortiz to finish the 2nd inning. His inning went like this:

• C. Hart walked
• G. Zaun hit by pitch, C. Hart to second
•  A. Escobar singled to shallow left, C. Hart scored, G. Zaun to second
• C. Narveson struck out looking
• R. Weeks singled to shallow left, G. Zaun to third, A. Escobar to second
• C. Gomez hit by pitch, G. Zaun scored, A. Escobar to third, R. Weeks to second
• R. Braun doubled to left, A. Escobar, R. Weeks and C. Gomez scored
• P. Fielder homered to deep right center, R. Braun scored

In his brief history he had never given up more then five runs in an inning. In his brief history he had never given up more then four runs in a Chavez Ravine start. Let us hope he never tops the numbers for this game.

His best part of the night was getting six straight swing and misses from Braun and Fielder with runners on 1st and 2nd. It was all downhill after that, as he couldn't find the strike zone, or when he did, they made him pay. Not like they hit him hard, Fielder was the only one who tagged him but because he had so many runners on base via the walk or HBP the bloops killed him, so he deserved this fate.

The Dodger ofense wasn't particularly effective either, driving in three runs against Naverson without the benefit of a base hit.  Two sacrifice flies and a ground ball. Woo Hoo. Kemp hit a line drive ground rule double and that is the only ball I can remember being hit hard against him. The offense finally broke through with some hard hit shots in the eighth against Manny Parra, capped by a three run bomb to center field by James Loney who is putting those Dodger Stadium blues to bed.

Charlie Haeger provided some solid long relief knuckleballing his way to four innings of one run ball as he tries to prove he belongs in a major league bullpen. Going to be very curious who stays and who goes this Friday when Weaver is activated.

So the three game winning streak is over, we are still in last place, and now we are relying on Billingsley once again to provide relief.