Dodgers bail out shaky start by Zack Greinke with late rally to beat Cubs

The Dodgers won a game started by Zack Greinke, which, on the surface, probably doesn’t sound surprising.

Only this wasn’t an ordinary start for Greinke.

Greinke was spared a deserved defeat Wednesday night, as the Dodgers did everything but turn on the bubble-dispensing machine in their dugout in a five-run seventh inning to reverse a three-run deficit.

The comeback vaulted the Dodgers to an 8-4 victory over the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field that ended a two-game losing streak and reduced their magic number to win the National League West to eight.

The Dodgers have nine games remaining in the regular season. The second-place San Francisco Giants have 10.

Considering the recent instability in their rotation, a loss with Greinke on the mound would have offered them a reason to panic. With Hyun-Jin Ryu recovering from a shoulder injury and rookie Carlos Frias pitching one of the worst games in baseball history the previous day, the Dodgers still haven’t announced who will start Monday in their series opener against the Giants at Dodger Stadium.

“As you get late in the year, every day is really like a playoff game,” Manager Don Mattingly said. “It swings the momentum in your favor every time you win, as far as the way you feel. But in the same breath, you lose a game like yesterday [16-2 in Colorado] and it’s like a shot in the gut.”

The Dodgers can now secure a place in the postseason as early as Friday. Another victory over the last-place Cubs, coupled with a defeat by the Milwaukee Brewers, would guarantee the Dodgers at least one of the two NL wild-card positions.

Pitching Friday for the Dodgers: Clayton Kershaw.

“We have our ace going tomorrow, so we feel even better,” catcher A.J. Ellis said.

The Dodgers also figure to have Hanley Ramirez in their lineup again.

Ramirez was prevented by a strained right elbow from starting the Dodgers’ two previous games. He returned Thursday and was two for four.

“He seemed OK,” Mattingly said. “At this point, if a guy says he’s good to go, he’s good to go. It can’t be a gray area. You’re in or you’re out. There can’t be excuses, you can’t do this, you can’t do that. You’re in, you’re in. If you’re out, you’re out.”

Asked if Mattingly would start Ramirez in Friday’s day game after Thursday’s night game, Mattingly replied, “If he says, ‘In.’”

Ramirez’s one-out single to right field started the Dodgers’ seventh-inning assault on Cubs reliever Neil Ramirez that made up a 4-1 deficit.

With Ramirez on first base, Mattingly used Carl Crawford to pinch-hit for Scott Van Slyke. A career .136 batter as a pinch-hitter, Crawford singled to advance Ramirez to third base.

Recalling the at-bat, Crawford laughed at how the absence of indoor batting cages at Wrigley Field prevented him from taking warmup swings.

“You can’t get loose here,” Crawford said. “I just went up there and saw the ball and hit it.”

The Cubs aided the comeback effort, as second baseman Logan Watkins botched a potential double-play grounder by Juan Uribe and allowed Ramirez to score.

Andre Ethier pinch-hit for Ellis and delivered a run-scoring double to left-center. Another pinch-hitter, Justin Turner, grounded out to push home another run, and the score was tied, 4-4.

Dee Gordon doubled in Ethier to move the Dodgers in front, 5-4. Gordon, in turn, scored on a single by Yasiel Puig to increase the advantage to 6-4.

The late surge made up for the uncharacteristic lack of command by Greinke, who was charged with four runs and nine hits over five innings.

“It was pretty bad location-wise,” Greinke conceded.

The first four batters Greinke faced all reached base, including Cuban rookie sensation Jorge Soler, who singled in the second of the Cubs’ two runs in the first inning.

“It felt like we were facing a 3-2 count with every batter,” Ellis said.

Greinke threw 31 pitches in the first inning.

The Cubs scored twice more in the fifth inning, with Soler’s second run-scoring single increasing the Dodgers’ deficit to 4-1. By the end of the inning, Greinke had thrown a season-high 112 pitches, and his night was over.

“Honestly, it didn’t look very good early,” Mattingly said. “But it ended up good. At this point of the year, it doesn’t matter what happens to you. You walk away with a W, you feel good about it.”

dylan.hernandez@latimes.com

Twitter: @dylanohernandez