Cubs vs. Dodgers 2017 live results: Score updates and highlights from NLCS Game 2

The Cubs lost Game 1 of the NLCS, even though they scored runs off of Clayton Kershaw. The problem is that they didn’t score runs off of anyone else, so the Dodgers won, 5-2.

Things don’t get easier in Game 2, as Rich Hill takes the mound for Los Angeles. At least Chicago has Jon Lester on the mound: even though 2017 was a down year for him, to this point, he’s seemed like the postseason ace they thought they were signing.

First pitch is at 7:38 p.m. ET, and we’ll be live blogging it all.

As usual, to catch up on the live blog, scroll down to the “1st inning” header and work your way back up to the present.

The Dodgers didn’t score when threatening in the eighth, but Jansen is in all the same: if he can get through the ninth unscathed, it gives the Dodgers a chance to walk off in the bottom of the inning. He’ll be facing the Cubs’ best, as Bryant, Rizzo, and Contreras are due up.

Bryant goes down swinging on a nasty 94 mph cutter, but the Cubs get a baserunner right after when Jansen hits Rizzo with a pitch. That ends Los Angeles’ streak of 24 consecutive batters retired by their bullpen.

Rizzo got hit on the hand, which will happen sometimes when you are essentially standing on home plate. That’s not a criticism, by the way: that plan is part of what makes Rizzo Rizzo, since it gives him more plate coverage, but it’s also why he led in hit by pitches with 24 and now his hand stings.

Jansen gets Contreras to 0-2, but he is focused on keeping Rizzo at first base. He’s not unfocused on the plate, however, as he just threw a 94 mph fastball high on Contreras that the backstop could not lay off of. Two outs, Almora coming up. Almora drove in the only Cubs’ runs of Game 1, and he’ll be followed by Russell, who is responsible for the lone Cubs’ run today.

Another 0-2 count, and Jansen is still throwing to first to keep Rizzo from getting any ideas. Rizzo goes on the 0-2 pitch, but Almora swings at ball one despite it being like, nose height, and somehow gets a piece of it to foul it off.

He then grounds out to short, despite Rizzo’s attempt to get his body in the way of the throw from Culberson. Sneaky, sneaky.

The Dodgers have a chance to walk off here, given to them by Jansen’s scoreless frame. Yasiel Puig, Charlie Culberson, and now Kenley Jansen are due up. It makes sense to bat Jansen here, since he can then pitch the 10th if necessary, which bridges to the top/middle of the Dodgers’ order for the bottom half of that frame.

Yasiel Puig walks on four pitches, and John Lackey is now warming in the Cubs’ bullpen. Culberson is showing bunt, and moves Puig over to second. You can forget everything I said previously about Jansen, as Kyle Farmer is pinch-hitting for him.

Farmer works a 3-2 count — it might be safer for Duensing to work out of the zone here, rather than give Farmer something he can hit. And Duensing does go low, and Farmer follows: two outs, Puig still on second, and Joe Maddon is on his way to the mound to bring in John Lackey through another double switch.

Leonys Martin takes Duensing’s spot in the lineup and moves to center in place of Almora. Lackey is pitching for the second time in this series — he’s never pitched on back-to-back days in his career. He faces Chris Taylor.

Lackey keeps trying to get Taylor to chase outside, but it’s not working. The count is 3-1, and Lackey is dangerously close to bringing Justin Turner to the plate with Puig in scoring position. Lackey gets a fastball by Taylor, and it’s a 3-2 count.

Lackey steps off twice, and the announcers talk about how it’s probably gamesmanship by the veteran. That theory is immediately disproven when Contreras walks up to the mound to figure out what the heck it is Lackey wants to throw.

Well, it was ball four, so that didn’t work. Here’s Justin Turner with the potential winning run on second. He’s already responsible for the lone run the Dodgers have tonight.

WELP, Justin Turner just hit a three-run homer to win the game for the Dodgers, so that John Lackey experiment maybe didn’t work out so well. The Dodgers are now up 2-0 in the NLCS, and we’ll be back for Game 3 on Tuesday in Chicago.

The Dodgers have their own double switch going, as Josh Fields enters for Curtis Granderson’s spot in the lineup, and Joc Pederson replaces Brandon Morrow in the lineup. Fields gets a fly out out of Baez, and that’s 19 bullpen outs in a row for the Dodgers. Given the way their offense is going in Game 2, they’re going to need to add to that number.

Here comes Tony Watson, with Fields just in to face the one batter. And Kenley Jansen is now warming in the bullpen, too, presumably to come into the game just in time for the Cubs’ heavy hitters. Zobrist and Jay are currently due up, and then it’s Bryant, Rizzo, and Contreras — but not until the ninth if Watson can do his job here.

So far, so good, with Zobrist flying out to right field amid another chorus of “Puig!” chants. And then he gets Jay to fly out in a hurry, so Jansen will indeed get Bryant, Rizzo, and Contreras in the ninth if Roberts wants to play that game.

It’s Bellinger, Joc Pederson, and Forsythe this inning, facing Brian Duensing. Bellinger should have been out at first on a grounder, but Duensing never secured the baseball on the throw from Rizzo, so Bellinger is safe at first.

Here comes Pederson, who is hitting in Enrique Hernandez’s spot, which became Chase Utley’s spot and then Brandon Morrow’w, and is now his. This is Pederson’s first postseason at-bat, and he uses it to bunt Bellinger over to second. The Dodgers are playing for one run here, but one run might be all they need with Jansen warming.

Forsythe gets an intentional walk to bring up Austin Barnes and give the Cubs a chance at a double play to end the inning and the threat. Duensing remains in the game, and his first pitch to Barnes misses low. Pitching coach Chris Bosio now comes out, probably to come up with a plane for Barnes, as Hector Rondon should be warmed up by now.

The plan worked, though, as Duensing got the double play, and it’s still 1-1 heading into the ninth inning.

Morrow is indeed back out for the seventh, and he retires Almora on one pitch. Addison Russell, who hit a homer earlier to give the Cubs their lone run, is making him work a bit more. He eventually struck out on a cutter, but it at least took six pitches — Morrow entered the at-bat having retired four batters on just nine of them.

Heyward fouled a pitch off the knob of his bat, which is probably the last thing he needs while facing Morrow. Another cutter makes it 0-2, and dear lord does that thing drop. Heyward then hits a tall fly ball to center, and Taylor eventually runs it down for the third out.

Here comes Pedro Strop for the Cubs in the bottom of the seventh. Jason Heyward is out, replaced by Ben Zobrist, so Maddon could perform another double switch. Culberson leads off the inning and grounds out, and Curtis Granderson follows suit.

Tony Watson and Josh Fields are both warming up in the Dodgers’ pen. There’s likely to be action with Morrow having thrown two innings, though, with the day off on Monday and his efficiency tonight, they could also push him a little further.

Taylor walks, and now Turner, who drove in the Dodgers’ lone run of the game, is up to bat. He’s worked a full count here, but as has happened with all but the one Dodgers’ threat to this point, it ends with no change in the score. On to the eighth.

We’ve got a tie game in Los Angeles, and both teams are into the bullpens. Brandon Morrow is in for the Dodgers now, and he gets Bryant and Rizzo out on just five total pitches. Willson Contreras then goes down swinging on three consecutive strikes, so Morrow not only pitched a 1-2-3, but he’s got more than enough gas left in the tank to pitch the seventh if Roberts wants him to.

Carl Edwards apparently only hates facing the Nationals, because he’s retired all three Dodgers he’s faced in Game 2. Now he has to face Puig, though, who has been having himself a postseason and already has a pair of walks tonight.

Puig clearly had no intention of swinging until he had to in this at-bat, as he just watched the 3-0 go by while basically stretching at the plate instead of even looking at what was coming, and did some random leg kick because why not?

He ended up striking out on a wicked curve, and it’s still 1-1 after six.

Addison Russell leads off the fifth inning for the Cubs, and on the fourth pitch of the at-bat, hits a solo home run to left to put Chicago on the board. 1-0, Cubs. Heyward, Baez, and Lester are still due up.

Heyward hits a grounder and then dives into first to try to beat out the throw — Hill didn’t cover, so Bellinger ran over, and he beat Heyward by enough that the Cubs won’t dare challenge the call.

Hill is at just 69 pitches and has given up just the one run, but Josh Fields is warming in the Dodgers’ bullpen as of this writing. He’s slated to hit second in the bottom half of the frame, so Dave Roberts might just want to try to do something that could generate offense here.

Or maybe he knew Hill was going to give up a single to Jon Lester of all people, and was just making sure he was ready to punish his starter for that. Jon Jay grounds out on the first pitch to make the universe right again, so that’s it for the fifth, and maybe even for Hill’s night.

Charlie Culberson gets five pitches out of Lester and then doubles, which is good for the Dodgers for two reasons: it continues to push Lester closer to being lifted, and also the Dodgers have a runner in scoring position with no outs. Corey Seager is wonderful, but Culberson has been filling in for him more than admirably.

Rich Hill is officially out of the game, as Curtis Granderson pinch-hits for him. Granderson ripped a ball down the first base line, and man, if that had been fair, it would be a tie game right now. That’s as close to helpful as Granderson got, though, as he popped out foul. Here’s Taylor again.

Taylor grounds out, but Lester is at 91 pitches, and the Cubs’ bullpen is stirring. It’s Carl Edwards Jr. in the pen, and now Justin Turner at the plate. Rich Hill is still in the dugout, and he is still saying “fuck” on camera on national television about being down by one run.

Don’t worry, Rich, you don’t have to swear anymore! Justin Turner puts a ball between first and second, and it’s now a tie game. 1-1.

Lester reaches his 100th pitch of the outing, a ball that brings Bellinger to a 2-2 count. The Dodgers came into this game with the idea of working Lester right out of it, and while it has only resulted in one run, they aren’t going to have to worry about Lester pitching to them for much longer.

Bellinger ends up walking, and that’s the end of the night for Lester. The lefty got through 4-2/3 innings with one run allowed, but also walked five batters and is responsible for the two runners still on — and the long night the Cubs’ bullpen still has ahead of them.

Carl Edwards Jr. is in, and he still has not had a good postseason. Chase Utley pinch-hits for Hernandez to give the Dodgers the platoon advantage in this matchup. Of course, Utley isn’t what he used to be, and that was pretty visually evident here.

Clayton Kershaw is doing a dugout interview now, and apparently he doesn’t know anything about spin rate and all the happy advanced stuff Rich Hill uses to thrive. Of course, he’s Clayton Kershaw: he hasn’t needed to put in work from those angles.

There’s a 1-2-3 inning for Hill, finished off in 11 pitches. He’s at 61, so if he keeps at this pace, the Dodgers should be able to build a shorter bridge to closer Kenley Jansen this time. Assuming they score runs and have a lead to be closed out, I mean.

Austin Barnes is out, courtesy a goofy/great Javier Baez catch in foul territory. Baez almost didn’t get it, but that’s kind of half of the fun, isn’t it?

Puig earns his second walk of the night, and Lester is up to 72 pitches through 3-2/3. That’s four walks for Lester so far, which ties the mark for most in a game in his postseason career. The last time Lester walked four in a playoff game was back in 2009 against the Angels, but at least he spread those out over six frames.

Puig tries to steal second base, but Willson Contreras has a serious arm, and Puig ends up getting tagged on the helmet on his way to the base, before he can touch it with his hands. Javier Baez is great at making tags, and that’s it for the fourth inning.

It’s Javier Baez, Jon Lester, and then Jon Jay and the top of the lineup due up in the third against Rich Hill. Baez walks to lead off the inning, so he still has his 0-for-20 postseason streak going, but at least he’s on base.

Lester sure looks like someone who doesn’t have a lot of bunting history, as he fouls off a ball that knocked him to the ground, and then bunted another foul for strike three.

There’s a wild pitch that Barnes completely whiffs on his attempt to block, and now Baez is at third base with just the one out. Oh that’s a nice play by Cody Bellinger, who is in with the runner on third, scoops up a grounder, looks the runner back, then trots over to first base to get the out. That gets rid of any sac fly that could score Baez. However, Bryant is up, and he has enough power for that to not matter.

Of course, don’t discount Rich Hill, who is pretty good at this whole pitching thing: Bryant strikes out on a 90 mph fastball, and Hill strands the runner his wildness created.

Rich Hill struck out when it was his turn to bat, so here’s Taylor again. TBS is doing one of those picture-in-picture dugout interviews instead of paying attention to the game, because it’s important for us to know how much Kyle Hendricks has learned from watching Jon Lester pitch.

Jason Heyward makes a catch in right that he had to show some effort for, so you know it was a tough one. Two down, Justin Turner and his gigantic beard up. He walks on four straight pitches, so now Lester is at 45 pitches through 2-2/3 despite the quick start to this frame.

Lester’s velocity seems down after he took that bunted foul ball to the chest in his last at-bat. Cody Bellinger just doubled on an 89 mph fastball down in the zone, and now Turner is at third base. It’ll be Hernandez’s job to put the Dodgers on the board here for the first run of the game by either club.

Hernandez apparently didn’t want that responsibility, as he just walked all the way to first base on ball three. When forced to return to the box, he flied out to right, ending the threat. Lester is at 55 pitches after three, Hill is at 50.

Albert Almora, the only Cubs player to drive in runs in Game 1, leads off the second inning. He hits a shot right back at Hill, which is lucky since the shift was on and it wouldn’t have been fielded any other way.

Addison Russell is the third strikeout of the game for Hill, and it happened real fast: three pitches, three strikes. Here’s Jason Heyward, who sat out Game 1 after a rough Game 5 of the NLDS. He picked up where he left off, grounding out to short, and that’s all for the top of the second.

Play-by-play announcer Brian Anderson is discussing how the Dodgers don’t have a big thumping bat in the lineup with Corey Seager out, which is weird, because he’s already seen Cody Bellinger — who hit 39 homers in what wasn’t even a full season in the majors — up to bat once today.

Enrique Hernandez draws a walk, and then Logan Forsythe works a 3-1 count, so Lester is having a little trouble finding the strike zone at the moment. These were always good moments for David Ross to center him, both in Boston and with Chicago, but that’s not an option anymore.

Forsythe lines out to left, and Hernandez stays at first, but as the broadcast points out, that’s already quite a few hard-hit balls hit right on the nose against Lester early in this game.

Austin Barnes, who is going to catch whenever there’s a lefty on the mound, strikes out against Lester. That brings up Yasiel Puig, and the thunderous chants of his name that come with that. Puig walks, which doesn’t generate more chants, but there are now two on for Charlie Culberson, who is continuing to play the role of Corey Seager in this series.

Culberson hits a flare to left, but Jason Heyward casually reels it in, as is his way. On to the third!

Rich Hill used to pitch for the Cubs — he was drafted by them back in 2002. Hill’s career with the Cubs was a combination of promising and disappointing thanks to injuries, but he’s been a different pitcher since he and Brian Bannister figured him out while with his hometown Red Sox.

The Dodgers have benefitted the most from this, including a 3.25 ERA over 25 starts and 135 innings this summer, and now Hill has a chance to put them up 2-0 in the NLCS.

Jon Jay opens up the game with a single to left, so the Cubs are off to a good start. Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo, per usual, are up next.

Yasiel Puig and Chris Taylor just almost collided in the outfield, but it wasn’t their fault: the sun is setting, and it is in both of their now-blinded eyes. Puig eventually convinced Taylor to back off and let him catch it, and there’s the first out of the game.

Rich Hill’s curveball is one of the best pitches around. He threw one of his 73 mile per hour ones right here, and Rizzo was way, way ahead of it. Strike three, two outs, here’s Willson Contreras with Jay still at first.

Contreras also goes down by way of a wicked curve in the mid-70s — this one looking — and the Dodgers manage to strand Jay.

Chris Taylor, who had the eventual game-winning homer in Game 1, leads off for the Dodgers, and grounds out. Justin Turner puts a ride into one that gets to deep center, but, despite the sun, Albert Almora Jr. is able to reel it in. He didn’t need to jump to make that catch, but he didn’t know that: he couldn’t see the dang ball, after all.

Cody Bellinger attempted to bunt his way on, which the broadcast notes he successfully pulled off six times in 2017. He just missed making it to first before the throw, however, so that’s the end of the inning — Dave Roberts didn’t bother to challenge the call.

It was a little weird that Bellinger stepped on first and then stopped running to turn around and point at the bag instead of running through. Don’t do that, it looks weird.