THE ANGELS — Clayton Kershaw became the Los Angeles Dodgers’ all-time leader in strikeouts on Saturday night, striking out Detroit Tigers rookie, Spencer Torkelsonin the fourth inning for his 2,697th career regular-season strikeout.
Kershaw, 34, surpassed Don Sutton, who last pitched for the Dodgers in 1988 and had been the franchise’s strikeout leader since 1979, before returning to the team in 1988 for his final year of 23 in the majors. .
Your new franchise strikeout leader, @ClaytonKersh22. pic.twitter.com/PgJaseUE1I
— Los Angeles Dodgers (@Dodgers) May 1, 2022
Kershaw leads all Dodgers players in Baseball-Reference WAR, while ranking third in starts, fourth in wins and fifth in innings. Since the start of the live-ball era in 1920, he has the lowest ERA of all time (2.48 before Saturday) and WHIP (1.00) among starting pitchers with at least 1,500 innings.
Kershaw struck out Dustin Garneau with a curveball to tie Sutton’s record of 2,696 strikeouts for the second out of the third inning, prompting a standing ovation from fans at Dodger Stadium. An inning later, with one on and none out, he had Torkelson pass a slider at 0-2 to set a new mark.
A graphic showing Kershaw as the franchise leader in strikeouts appeared on the video boards and another standing ovation followed. Kershaw removed his cap and lightly patted his chest in thanks, then walked around the mound and raised his cap again as the cheers increased.
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Kershaw breaks Sutton’s strikeout record with Dodgers