Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw takes a long view after giving up three home runs

When his outing was over, when the three home runs had landed, Clayton Kershaw climbed the steps that connect the ballpark at Camelback Ranch with the Dodgers clubhouse. At times on Friday night, he looked fierce, carving up the Seattle Mariners with precise usage of his fastball, curveball and slider.

And on three separate occasions, he craned his neck toward the sky to watch baseballs take flight. The three homers combined for four runs across five innings in Kershaw’s fifth Cactus League start.

“It’s always good to be humbled,” Kershaw said. “So this was a good one for me tonight.”

The flurry of power from Seattle offered a new wrinkle in an otherwise dominant spring for Kershaw, who has shown no lingering effects of the back injury that sidelined him last summer. His earned-run average for the spring jumped to 3.00 after Friday’s outing. He raised his pitch count to 70, and will make one more lengthy start before tapering back to set himself up for opening day on April 3.

On only three occasions in the regular season has Kershaw allowed three homers in one game. He described some of the trouble on Friday as violations of “pitching 101,” like a leadoff walk to Seattle third baseman Danny Valencia in the fourth inning or a hanging 0-2 curveball to outfielder Leonys Martin in the fifth. Valencia came around to score on the next at-bat, when outfielder Tyler O’Neill hit a two-run shot. Martin volleyed the curve over the right-field fence.

Later in the fifth, Kershaw left a fastball over the middle for Valencia. His solo shot cleared the left-field fence.

“I can live with homers,” Kershaw said. “I feel like the three balls they hit tonight just happened to go over the fence. That’s not always going to happen. But obviously you can’t let that happen.”

Save for the three mistakes, Kershaw set aside most of the opposing batters with ease. He struck out eight, including four of the first five batters he faced.

“It was kind of weird,” Kershaw said. “When I felt like I was executing, it felt like I was doing a pretty good job. But there wasn’t really an in-between tonight. It was either really good, or really bad. Some margin for error, that just didn’t happen tonight.”

Roberts’ father dies

Manager Dave Roberts left the team Friday after the death of his father, Waymon, at the age of 68. A Dodgers spokesman indicated the team was unsure when Roberts was expected to return.

Bench coach Bob Geren managed the game at Camelback Ranch on Friday evening. Bill Hasselman, the triple-A Oklahoma City manager, managed against the Padres in Peoria.

Waymon Roberts served in the Marines for three decades. He met his wife, Eiko, in Okinawa, where Dave was born. The family settled in San Diego in the early 1980s. He watched his son play for 10 years, and saw him become the Dodgers’ manager in 2016. Roberts is the first African-American manager in franchise history.

“I hate to use the word monumental,” Waymon told The Times last year. “But it was monumental to us.”

Short hops

Corey Seager (oblique stiffness) practiced on the field for the second day in a row. Seager took some swings and fielded ground balls. He has not appeared in a game since tweaking his back and his side on a throw on March 3. . . . Reliever Josh Ravin has been held out of action since Monday due to groin tightness. Ravin has an outside chance to make the roster, but may be optioned to the minors to preserve the organization’s depth.

andy.mccullough@latimes.com

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