http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/15/sports/baseball/clayton-kershaw-la-dodgers-ny-yankees.html 2016-09-15 03:45:17 Clayton Kershaw’s Strong Start Helps Dodgers Defeat Yankees Kershaw, in only his second start since returning from the disabled list, pitched five scoreless innings and allowed one hit, in the fifth. === Clayton Kershaw stood atop the mound at Yankee Stadium on Wednesday afternoon, the sun shining on him as shadows covered the batter’s box 60 feet 6 inches away, and fired a 94-mile-per-hour fastball low and outside for his first pitch of the game. Kershaw, the Kershaw had only recently returned from more than two months on the disabled list and was operating under a tight pitch limit. In his first game back, last Friday against the Marlins, he pitched for only three innings. He lasted for five against the The blissful weather that Kershaw found at the beginning of his start did not last. Instead, the Stadium soon became puddle-strewn. A 12-minute rain delay hit just over an hour after the game began. Another one followed 25 minutes after that. Between the raindrops, and over nearly four hours, the Dodgers defeated the Yankees, 2-0, as the teams combined for just seven hits. Kershaw made it through both delays, taking the mound for the fifth inning after sitting for almost an hour. Although he had not given up a hit to that point, the bigger question for him and the Dodgers was whether he could continue his preparation for the team’s potential postseason appearance (the Dodgers have a comfortable lead in the National League West). So, after Kershaw allowed a single to Chase Headley before completing the fifth, it made Dodgers Manager Dave Roberts’s decision to lift him after 64 pitches simple. The game’s decisive moment came much later. The teams took a scoreless tie into the top of the ninth, and the Yankees put in their closer, Dellin Betances, to maintain it. But Betances was undone by his defense and his own mistakes. Starlin Castro flubbed a ground ball from Corey Seager, who then stole second. When Justin Turner turned on a curveball from Betances and struck a line drive down the left-field line for a double, it brought home the first run of the day. Betances exacerbated the Yankees’ troubles with a throwing error that allowed a second run to score. The loss to the Dodgers hurt the Yankees’ playoff hopes, and it came after they heard that Aaron Judge, their power-hitting outfielder, would probably miss the rest of the regular season because of an oblique muscle injury he sustained Tuesday night. Judge had a rocky first month with the club. He came up billed as a slugger with hard-to-rival strength, and he flashed his power in his first at-bat when he cracked a home run over Monument Park in center field. He also struck out in half of his 84 at-bats and hit just .189, with four home runs. As the Yankees look to 2017, and Judge’s place on the team, they will evaluate him with just a 27-game sample size. “He’ll have to earn his way on like everybody next year,” General Manager Brian Cashman said. “There’s no absolutes. I think without question he’ll be better for his experiences here in 2016 as he competes in 2017 with whatever we have.” For now, that is a far-off worry. The Yankees are still in the wild-card race, only two games behind the Toronto Blue Jays for the final playoff spot. On Wednesday, they lost a chance to gain ground, however difficult that might have been against Kershaw. “I think the big thing is when he gives you an opportunity to hit the ball, you better hit it,” Manager Joe Girardi had said before the game. “Because his stuff is very good, and you hope that he’s still rusty. There’s no guarantee of that. He hasn’t had a whole lot of starts, and I’m sure he’s somewhat limited on how many pitches he can go today. To me, you better take advantage of the situation.”