Cubs cure all that ails Dodgers offense; Ethier extends streak in 5-2 win

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If only the Dodgers could play the Chicago Cubs every day. They would go from offensively inept to Murderers’ Row meets Big Red Machine.

It’s not as if the Dodgers piled up the hits Monday night, but they made them count, made them add up to a 5-2 victory in front of 30,239, as Andre Ethier extended his career-high hitting streak to 28 games.

In the last 10 games, the Dodgers have played the Cubs four times. In those 10 games, they scored 32 runs. In the other six, they scored 16.

With Clayton Kershaw throwing seven effective innings, Vicente Padilla pitching a perfect eighth and Jonathan Broxton picking up a clean seventh save, the Dodgers made their little offensive outburst hold up.

Kershaw gave up a run in the first inning on three one-out hits, but the Dodgers regained the lead for good with two runs in the second against left-hander James Russell.

Matt Kemp singled and scored on a double off the right-field wall by Juan Uribe. With two outs, Ivan De Jesus Jr. picked up his first career run batted in when he singled down the right-field line, right in front of his father, Cubs coach Ivan De Jesus.

The Dodgers chased Russell with three runs in the fifth inning. With runners at first and second, rookie Jerry Sands doubled to right-center field, driving in both runners.

Sands is hitting only .196, but he’s making his hits count. Of his nine hits, six have been doubles.

Ethier, hitless in his first two at-bats, then bounced a hit into the hole between shortstop and third base. Shortstop Starlin Castro ran the ball down, but it deflected off his out-reached glove for an infield hit.

That left Ethier with the longest streak in baseball since Washington’s Ryan Zimmerman hit in 30 consecutive games April 18-May 12, 2009. The 28-game streak is the second longest in Los Angeles Dodgers history. Willie Davis holds the all-time franchise mark of 31 games set in 1969.

The Dodgers finished with only seven hits Monday. The Cubs, however, have the National League’s highest earned-run average at 4.98.

-- Steve Dilbeck