--RHP Chad Billingsley tossed his first complete game since July 23, 2007, when he threw a five-hitter in a 10-2 win at Houston. It was the fourth complete-game shutout by a Dodgers pitcher this year. Hiroki Kuroda has two and Eric Stults has one. Billingsley has won 11 games, one shy of his total for all of last season.
--RHP Brad Penny, who has been on the 15-day disabled list since June 17 with inflammation and mild tendinitis in his right shoulder, will make a rehabilitation start Saturday for Class AAA Las Vegas at Oklahoma City. That would put Penny in line to start for the Dodgers on Aug. 8 at San Francisco. That would result in struggling RHP Hiroki Kuroda being pushed back to Aug. 9, giving him one extra day of rest after his next scheduled start, Saturday night against Arizona. --OF Matt Kemp went 1-for-2 and walked twice, extending his hitting streak to 17 games. That is the longest streak by a Dodgers player since Nomar Garciaparra hit in 22 games in a row from June 16-July 13, 2006. Kemp is hitting .371 (26 for 70) during the streak.
--2B Jeff Kent went 2-for-4 and had an RBI double in the third inning. That was his first extra-base hit and his first RBI in eight games. Kent had hit just .186 (11-for-59) in his previous 16 games.
--3B Casey Blake went 2-for-3 with a pair of singles, giving him multiple-hit games in three of his first five games with the Dodgers. Blake was acquired from Cleveland on Saturday for minor-leaguers Jon Meloan and Carlos Santana. Since the trade, Blake is hitting .412 (7-for-17) with three doubles and four runs.
BY THE NUMBERS: .281 -- Batting average for the Dodgers in their first nine games of the second half, during which they averaged 5.2 runs and won six times. The Dodgers hit a collective .253 before the All-Star break, 12th in the National League, while averaging 4.1 runs a game. They entered play Sunday with the third-best second-half batting average in the N.L., trailing only Colorado (.383) and Pittsburgh (.295).
QUOTE TO NOTE: "Don isn't going to tell you what you want to hear. He will tell you what he sees. Some players don't like that. They want to hear that they took a good swing when they rolled the ball over, and that's not a good swing. As a coach, your job is obviously to root for these guys, but at least be honest. If you can't be honest, you're not doing your job as a coach, and you're definitely doing a disservice to the athlete." -- Dodgers third-base coach Larry Bowa on what to expect from new hitting coach Don Mattingly.
