Dodgers Fans Only

If you’re a fan of Los Angeles sports, then you happen to be undoubtedly preparing the afternoon with steaks and adult beverages preparing for a day with the Clippers (facing elimination), Kings (who can advance the Stanley Cup right now) and the Dodgers. But there is usually a thing for absolutely everyone, such as the return of golfer Dicky Pride. Today’s sports on tv.

IndyCar Racing: Indianapolis 500 Time Trials (12:Ǡ PM, NBC Sports)
Final day of time trials is identified as bump day, where the slowest qualifiers risk being knocked out of the Indianapolis 500.

MLB Baseball: Cincinnati Reds at New York Yankees (1:00 PM, Fox Sports Ohio)
After being shutout by Andy Pettitte in the series opener, the Cincinnati Reds bounced back behind a 3-run Joey Votto homer, beating the Yankees 6-five on Saturday. The rubber match will be amongst aces Johnny Cueto and C.C. Sabathia.

Nationwide Racing: Pioneer Hi-Bred 250 at Iowa Speedway (two:00 PM, ESPN)
In spite of the Cup series running their annual All-Star showcase this weekend, the Nationwide series continues their season at Iowa Speedway.

Stanley Cup Playoffs: Phoenix Coyotes at Los Angeles Kings (3:00 PM, NBC)
We don’t want to say that the Kings have dominated the series heading into Sunday’s game 4 meeting. But the Kings are 3-, with two of the 3 wins by far more than one aim. A win signifies a berth to the Stanley Cup for the Kings.

PGA Golf: Byron Nelson Championship (3:00 PM, CBS)
Jason Dufner leads the field by a stroke over Dicky Pride, J.J. Henry and Jason Day.

NBA Playoffs: Miami Heat at Indiana Pacers (3:30 PM, ABC)
The Heat appeared to be the favorites with a comfortable game a single win over the Pacers. Since then the Pacers have won the next two with a convincing 19-point win on Thursday. If the Heat fail to rebound on Sunday, they will be a three-1 hole with a achievable elimination game on Tuesday.

MLB Baseball: St. Louis Cardinals at Los Angeles Dodgers (8:00 PM, ESPN)
The Dodgers are the best team in baseball right now and I actually hate the Cardinals. If the Reds beat the Yankees Sunday afternoon and the Dodgers sweep St. Louis, Cincinnati will only be Ǒ games behind initial place.

NBA Playoffs: San Antonio Spurs at Los Angeles Clippers (ten:30 PM, TNT)
Now even a 22-point lead in the initial quarter was sufficient for the Clippers to win game three. Instead the Spurs went on a 24- run in the third quarter, beating Los Angeles by ten. If the Spurs win Sunday night, they’ll be the first team to earn a berth in the conference finals.

LOS ANGELES—Getting shut out by Clayton Kershaw was the least of the St. Louis Cardinals’ issues. They may possibly have to do with no first baseman Lance Berkman for a even though because of an injured right knee.

Kershaw outdueled Jake Westbrook with a six-hitter for his fourth profession shutout, top the Los Angeles Dodgers to a 6- victory on Saturday night.

“The initial couple of innings I threw mainly fastballs,” stated the 24-year-old left-hander, who is 14-1 with a 1.40 ERA in his final 19 begins at house. “The moment I established it, I utilised my breaking ball a lot more, and the mixture worked. They have a great lineup, but losing Lance Berkman is a large blow for them.”

Berkman injured himself stretching for a throw from shortstop Rafael Furcal on Justin Sellers’ groundout for the third out of the second inning. Matt Carpenter took over at initial and committed a fielding error on a difficult-hit grounder by former Cardinal Adam Kennedy in the fourth, allowing the game’s very first two runs to score.

The switch-hitting Berkman, a six-time All-Star and the NL comeback player of the year in 2011, has played in only 13 games this season and is batting .333 with a homer and 4 RBIs.

In Friday night’s series opener, he homered as a pinch-hitter against Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen with two out in the ninth to tie the score, prior to the Cardinals lost in the bottom half on a bases-loaded walk. The homer ended the longest season-opening property run drought of his career immediately after 40 at-bats.

Berkman had just come off the disabled list final Sunday immediately after becoming sidelined for 21 games because of a strained left calf he aggravated whilst chasing a popup. One more trip to the DL is a distinct possibility, judging by the way he was limping around in the clubhouse.

“I wish I knew,” said Berkman, who has been on the DL 5 instances. “We’re just going to wait and see what the MRI says, but it just does not feel correct. It buckled on me twice, and I don’t know why it did that. I was in a position to move about OK in right here, and then it buckled again. So I have to be careful with it. It really is not too painful, but it is just a weird feeling. I wish I could describe it. There’s a little bit of instability that’s mildly regarding.”

Kershaw did not walk a batter for the third time this season although lowering his ERA from two.22 to 1.90.

“It is scary, but he keeps acquiring far better,” catcher A.J. Ellis said. “It just offers us a ton of confidence in this clubhouse that when it is his day to pitch, he’s going to give us an awesome likelihood to win the game. You know what you happen to be obtaining with Kersh. He’s the same steady guy on and off the field, and he knows he’s got a job to do no matter what the circumstances. He wants every game true badly, but you could tell he truly wanted this one.”

The reigning NL Cy Young winner earned the seventh total game of his career on 116 pitches, striking out four and not permitting a runner past second base against an offense that came in major the NL in team batting common, runs, homers, on-base percentage and slugging percentage.

Sellers triggered a four-run seventh inning with his very first home run of the season for the NL West-top Dodgers, who improved the best record in the majors to 27-13.

The Dodgers beat the defending Planet Series champions for the sixth straight time – their longest winning streak against the Cardinals since an eight-game stretch from July 24, 1975 by way of Might 12, 1976.

Westbrook (4-three) was charged with four runs – three earned – and six hits in 6 1-3 innings. The 34-year-old appropriate-hander, pitching at Dodger Stadium for the very first time in his 12-year profession, departed following giving up Kershaw’s opposite-field double off the glove of left fielder Matt Holliday. It was Kershaw’s initial extra-base hit right after hitting 28 singles more than 5 seasons.

Tony Gwynn Jr. greeted Eduardo Sanchez with a single that drove in Kershaw. The Dodgers got two far more runs that inning when Gwynn scored on Sanchez’s wild pitch and Andre Ethier added an RBI single that enhanced his NL-finest RBI total to 36.

Westbrook knew he would have his work cut out for himself facing the Dodgers’ ace, but he didn’t let that distract him.

“You attempt not to do that, simply because you always want to go out there and throw a decent ballgame and place up zeros no matter who you’re facing,” Westbrook said. “If you place as well considerably added pressure on yourself, it is actually counter-productive. So you just go out there and pitch your game and do the best you can.”

Ellis doubled his initial two times up, and has reached base with a hit or a walk in 31 of his first 32 games – which includes the finalಜ in a row. He entered Saturday with a .459 on-base percentage, the second-highest in the majors behind the Mets’ David Wright (.510).

Notes: Dee Gordon, the Dodgers’ standard shortstop and leadoff batter, got the night off following going two for 31 with 10 strikeouts and a single walk in the prior seven games. Mattingly said just before the game that he will sit him for a handful of days. … Kershaw, who led the NL with 248 strikeouts final season, has created 13 consecutive starts with out reaching double digits in strikeouts. … In eight starts this season, Westbrook has yielded just one run more than the 1st three innings. He has created only two other standard-season appearances against the Dodgers, each in relief for Cleveland in 2003.

LOS ANGELES (AP) – Nothing was going to rattle the calm, cool and collected Spurs. Not even a 24-point deficit.

Tim Duncan scored 19 points, helping engineer a defining Ǹ- run in the third quarter, and San Antonio defeated the Los Angeles Clippers 96-86 on Saturday to take a commanding 3- lead in their second-round playoff series.

“We didn’t plan on getting down that considerably,” mentioned Duncan, who at 36 is hungry to win the team’s fifth NBA championship and initial given that 20Ǧ-07. “We stuck with it.”

Led by Tony Parker’s 23 points and his defense on an ailing Chris Paul, the Spurs kept operating their plays even as Blake Griffin’s early offensive assault buried them in a large hole. Griffin missed 3 shots in the very first half, when he scored 20 points and carried his team to a 24-point lead despite a left hip injury and a sprained appropriate knee.

“They came out like we expected, really powerful. Blake was generating crazy shots,” Parker said. “We just took our time. It’s a long game, a extremely extended game. At halftime, we were extremely calm.”

Griffin had 28 points and 16 rebounds, and reserve Mo Williams added 19 points for the Clippers, who face some daunting NBA history heading into Game 4 on Sunday at Staples Center. No team has rallied from a three- deficit to win a series.

“If we don’t play with that sense of urgency, it really is not going to be fairly,” Griffin said.

The Clippers played a need to-win Game 7 in the opening round on the road at Memphis and succeeded.

“We have to keep fighting,” Paul said.

Rookie Kawhi Leonard added 14 points and Manu Ginobili 13 to help the leading-seeded Spurs win their 17th in a row and improve to 7- in the playoffs.

“We all struggled in the first quarter. We did not feel correct out there,” said Duncan, who like his teammates, looked to Parker to pick the team up.

“We follow his lead. He stuck with it, created some huge shots down the stretch and continued to attack,” Duncan mentioned. “He was playing defense truly challenging and got up into Chris.”

In addition to Parker, the Spurs threw two other defenders at Paul. He finished with 12 points and 11 assists following two earlier sub-par efforts in the series.

“Tony truly ran the show effectively,” Spurs coach Gregg Popovich mentioned. “I’d say, ‘Let’s do this’ and he mentioned, ‘No, let’s do this,’ and we’d do it.”

After a quiet 1st half in which he scored eight points, Duncan helped the Spurs manage the third quarter when they outscored Los Angeles 26-8.

The Spurs took their first lead for the duration of the 24- run on a fadeaway jumper by Duncan, who scored nine points in the outburst that put them ahead for very good. Danny Green added seven and Leonard 5.

“We kept telling Kawhi and Danny to stay calm,” Parker said.

The Clippers’ defense entirely faltered and they piled up miss following miss on the offensive end.

“When they spread the floor and Tim Duncan runs a high pick-and-roll, it really is difficulty for a lot of teams,” Griffin said. “That’s fundamentally what killed us in the third. This is what they do greatest.”

The Clippers scored the final 4 points of the third, which ended with a turnover by Williams, to trail 69-61 heading into the fourth.

“You knew they were going to make a run. It was just a matter of trying to withstand it,” Griffin said. “In the second half, specially the third quarter, we did a poor job of responding.

“I missed some shots I hit in the 1st half, effortless shots.”

San Antonio led by 11 points early in the fourth just before the Clippers got within seven on consecutive baskets by Williams. Gary Neal hit a 3-pointer to launch a 13-9 spurt, capped by Parker’s 3-pointer, that extended the Spurs’ lead to 89-78. Paul, so dominant in the final period throughout the normal season, was limited to four points.

“I felt like we had been playing good, but if you know something about the Spurs, you know they are not going to let up,” Paul mentioned. “Everybody knows how explosive the Spurs are, but we just could not get a quit.”

Reggie Evans, a defensive spark for the Clippers off the bench, missed 6 of 8 cost-free throws in the final 3:42.

“They play the very same whether or not they’re up 20 or down 20,” Griffin mentioned of the veteran Spurs. “Their communication and rotations are so excellent. Offensively, they know exactly what they’re going to do in every single scenario.”

The Spurs had beenʼn of 22 from 3-point range, with Leonard hitting three.

Los Angeles came in two-1 at house in the playoffs and 24-9 in the course of the standard season. With their red-clad sellout crowd on its feet, the Clippers were nonetheless shooting 63 percent midway through the second quarter, when Griffin’s a single-handed dunk kept them ahead by 20 points.

The Spurs closed the half on a 15-5 spurt, with Parker and Ginobili scoring five every, to trail 53-43 at the break. Griffin missed just three of his 13 shots in the initial half, when the Clippers controlled the boards and the paint.

The Clippers opened the game with a rush, outscoring the Spursಡ-11 although shooting 64 percent. Los Angeles ended the initial quarter on a 20-two run, which includesಎ in a row. Griffin scored 12 points in the spurt, hitting eight straight although the Spurs committed six turnovers and produced just 5 of 20 field objectives.

Notes: The Clippers have lost 29 of 33 games against the Spurs dating to Dec. 1, 2003. … The Clippers have dropped all three games in the series by double digits. … The Clippers have lost all six of their playoff series in franchise background immediately after losing Game 1. … The teams had been even in the paint with 44 points each and every following the Spurs had dominated there in Game 2. … The Clippers controlled the boards, 44-41, following becoming outrebounded in seven of their prior nine playoff games.

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The city of Los Angeles fed off the touch of victory as within moments the Los Angeles Dodgers walked-off with a game-winning walk to defeat the St. Louis Cardinals, and then urgently delivered the formula across town to Staples Center as the Lakers completed off the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 3 of the Western Conference Semi-Finals.

In spite of locking up down each Russell Westbrook and James Harden for the game, the Thunder duo nonetheless located a way to get to the charity stripe, combining to score 18 points from there. Both players completed the contest with 21 points apiece.

Kevin Durant was his usual self, pouring in 31 points. Among the 3 was an output of 73 points, great for 76 percent of the team’s scoring output.

So why the loss?

The rest of the team shot 10-for-29, or 34.four percent on the evening, and genuinely let a lackadaisical start off couple with a porous finish as the Lakers.

Game 4 is pivotal for the Lakers, and I know it is an apparent factor to say, but if something at all goes incorrect, this series could be as excellent as more than.

The Lakers are now four-1 at house after going 26-7 there throughout the normal season.

They will want an additional large game from Kobe Bryant on the offensive end, and Andrew Bynum on the defensive finish. No lead is safe against the Thunder, as was evident last night.

The moment the Lakers get comfortable is the moment that Durant, Westbrook or Harden will change the pace of the game and blitz past the Lakers.

Entertaining Facts:

• The Lakers lead the general playoff series by a margin of five-four. The Lakers also lead the Thunder/Sonics franchise by a margin of 26-13.
• Thanks to the NBA’s shortened schedule, the Lakers will be playing in their first back-to-back playoff games because Might 22-23, 1999 when they played the San Antonio Spurs.
• The Lakers made their initial 28 cost-free throws ahead of seeing Andrew Bynum miss on their 29th try with 9:15 left in last night’s game. On the evening they shot 41-of-42, a percentage of 97.6.

Keys to a Laker Victory:

Draw Fouls
Free of charge throws are totally free, proper? So what’s the excuse for missing them. None say the Lakers, who have missed a combined 4 free of charge throws in the 3 games to commence this series. In Games 1 and 2 they shot 29 total totally free throws, but overwhelmed that number in Game three by going to the line 42 times.

Foul pressure forced James Harden of all players to play dangerously, especially in a close game where the loss of a key player is enormous. Harden is a foul machine, and the Lakers took full benefit in Game three. Repeating the successful formula will permit for the Lakers to tighten up a shooting matchup, which they clearly can not win.

Thus, get those cost-free throw possibilities, and most importantly, make them.

Get Ramon Sessions Inolved
As silly as it could sound, Ramon Sessions had 4 points on a combined 2-for-10 shooting in Games 1 and 2, and killed lots of the momentum the Lakers had at essential moments. Sessions is that 1 player that could have changed the tide in Game 2, which would have us speaking differently about today’s contest.

But, that changed in Game three as Sessions came ready to play, shooting 5-for-9, scoring 12 points, grabbing two rebounds, and dishing 4 assists. Whilst his game has been foreshadowed by that of Steve Blake, it most definitely should not be forgotten.

Maintain Sessions doing whatever he was doing in Game three. I can promise that his play surely made a difference, and will continue to do so as this series extends itself beyond tomorrow.

The Small Items
Unselfish play will ultimately lift the Lakers over a majorly talented Thunder team. Intelligent passing, and effective play can go a extended way. It’s the small items that make a squad a championship team. Youth may possibly outrun a slew of veterans, but they can seldom outsmart them.

The Lakers dished out 20 assists on Friday night, besting efforts of 14 assists in Game 1, followed by 11 in Game two.

Blocked shots created more of an appearance in Game three as nicely as the Lakers swatted nine attempts by the Thunder, trouncing efforts of three blocks in Game 1, and just two in Game two.

Huge differences lie in these numbers, and they are key to evening this series tonight.

Very best-Case Prediction: Lakers 103, Thunder 100
Worst-Case: Thunder 114, Lakers 97

Game four, Semi-Finals, Western Conference
Oklahoma City Thunder at Los Angeles Lakers
7:Ǿ PM PST, May 20, 2012
Staples Center, Los Angeles, California
Television: TNT
Radio: 710 AM (English), 1330 AM (Spanish)

Series Recap:
Game 1: Lakers 90, Thunder絷
Game 2: Lakers 75, Thunder 77
Game 3: Thunder 96, Lakers 99
Game 4: Tonight
Game five: Could 21, at Oklahoma City – 6:30 p.m. – TNT
*Game 6: Might 23, vs Oklahoma City – TBD – ESPN
*Game 7: Could 27, at Oklahoma City – TBD – TNT
*if needed

Thunder Projected Starting Line-Up:
PG: Russell Westbrook
SG: Thabo Sefolosha
SF: Kevin Durant
PF: Serge Ibaka
C: Kendrick Perkins

Key Reserves: G James Harden, G Derek Fisher, F Nick Collison