The Sports Report: Dodgers continue to roll

Howdy, I’m your host, Houston Mitchell. Let’s get right to the news.

From Jack Harris: The Dodgers’ big three opened the scoring Sunday afternoon when Mookie Betts, Trea Turner and Freddie Freeman hit consecutive singles to lead off the first inning.

But, in a perhaps auspicious sign for an at-times top-heavy lineup, it was the middle of the order that keyed a 7-4 win over the San Francisco Giants at Dodger Stadium.

Unlike most days, when the Dodgers’ superstar trio typically carries the offensive load, the Nos. 4 to 7 batters in the order provided the most offensive fireworks.

Collectively, they went seven for 15 with six RBIs. They also orchestrated a pair of three-run rallies, helping the Dodgers (64-30) extend their winning streak to a season-high eight games and complete a four-game sweep of the Giants (48-47) for the first time since 1995.

Cleanup hitter Jake Lamb had two doubles and an RBI. Gavin Lux went two for four with two RBIs. Max Muncy had an RBI double and two runs scored. Trayce Thompson also drove in a pair in a two-for-four display.

“We got contributions from everyone up and down the lineup,” manager Dave Roberts said. “It’s really, really good to see the team offense.”

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ANGELS

The Angels have been struggling for most of the last two months, and Reid Detmers credits his teammates with staying the course and not getting too frustrated.

“We’ve had a couple of rough patches obviously, but everyone in here treats it like another day,“ Detmers said. “There’s nothing crazy about it. We don’t think about it. We go out and play. We don’t think about that stuff.“

Taylor Ward homered in a five-run first, Detmers pitched five scoreless innings and the Angels cooled off the Atlanta Braves with a 9-1 victory Sunday.

Max Stassi went 3 for 4 and drove in three runs, and Ward had three hits for the Angels, who improved to 3-14 this month and snapped a five-game skid. They had dropped 14 of 16 and were a season-worst 16 games under .500.

GALAXY

From Kevin Baxter: Sunday night’s match wasn’t so much a must-win game as it was a can’t-lose one for the Galaxy.

After three consecutive losses, all to MLS Western Conference opponents, the Galaxy entered their game against Atlanta United below the playoff line for the first time this season, closer to last place than they were to first.

Another loss and the tailspin might become irreversible.

“If you look at it as a pure points total, then I would say there’s obviously urgency,” Galaxy coach Greg Vanney acknowledged. “We all feel that urgency.”

And the Galaxy played that way against a sloppy, struggling Atlanta team, riding an early goal from Kévin Cabral and a late score from Dejan Joveljic to a 2-0 win before an announced 24,122 at Dignity Health Sports Park.

LAKERS

Former Lakers player Slava Medvedenko is selling his two NBA championship rings to raise money for his native Ukraine.

Medvedenko was a power forward on the Lakers’ championship teams in 2001 and ’02, playing alongside Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal.

SCP Auctions is donating the entire final sale price of both rings to Medvedenko’s Fly High Foundation. Its goal is to support Ukrainian children by restoring the sports infrastructure of the war-torn country’s schools and launching a network of social sports clubs.

“We want to restore gyms because the Russian army bombed more than a hundred schools,” he told the Associated Press by phone on Sunday. “Our country, they need a lot of money to fix the schools. Sports gyms are going to be last in the line to fix it. In Ukraine, we have winter and kids need to play inside.”

TRACK AND FIELD

From Andrew Greif: Behind sprint sweeps, breakthrough throwing medals and the indomitable talent of hurdler Sydney McLaughlin, the United States spent 10 days serving a forceful reminder that it is still what Sebastian Coe, the leader of track and field’s global governing body, called the sport’s “powerhouse.”

Yet for 10 days, as the world’s best competed in front of few sellouts while questions lingered about how much of the action went noticed outside of Hayward Field’s forest-green seats, the first world outdoor championships held in the U.S. offered a different reminder, and fresh concerns, that this country is “not punching its weight” as a market for growing the sport’s popularity, Coe added.

To change that World Athletics, under the tenure of Coe, and USA Track & Field are working on a joint plan with the goal that track and field be the fifth most-popular sport in the U.S. by the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. That would be an improvement of three spots from a 2019 study conducted by Nielsen. USATF has said it will introduce a five-city domestic circuit beginning next year, with a stop in Los Angeles.

The initiative even has an operating title: “Project USA.”

Eugene, Ore., Coe said, is “absolutely an obsessive track and field community.”

But the U.S. as a whole?

A “tough nut to crack,” he said.

TOUR DE FRANCE

Jonas Vingegaard blossomed from a talented rookie to a dominant leader in his own right over three weeks of epic racing to win his first Tour de France title Sunday.

The former fish factory worker from Denmark dethroned defending champion Tadej Pogacar with memorable performances in the mountains in cycling’s biggest race.

The 25-year-old Vingegaard, who was runner-up to Pogacar in his first Tour last year, excelled in the scorching heat that enveloped France this month and came out on top of a thrilling duel with Pogacar, the big favorite at the start of the race.

THIS DATE IN SPORTS

1902 — Jim Jeffries knocks out Bob Fitzsimmons in the eighth round to retain the world heavyweight title.

1941 — Lefty Grove of the Boston Red Sox wins his 300th and last game, beating the Cleveland Indians 10-6.

1956 — Swaps sets an American record in a 1 5/8-mile race at Hollywood Park. Swaps runs the course in 2:38 1-5.

1956 — Jack Burke Jr. defeats Ted Kroll 3 and 2 in the final round to win the PGA championship.

1976 — In Montreal, Edwin Moses of the United States sets an Olympic record in the 400 hurdles with a time of 47.63.

1982 — Janet Anderson wins the U.S. Women’s Open golf title, her first tournament victory.

2007 — Michael Rasmussen, the leader of the Tour de France, is removed from the race by his Rabobank team after winning the 16th stage. Rasmussen is sent home for violating (the team’s) internal rules. The Danish cyclist missed random drug tests May 8 and June 28, saying he was in Mexico.

2010 — Alberto Contador wins the Tour de France for the third time in four years. Contador holds off a next-to-last day challenge from Andy Schleck of Luxembourg, his runner-up for a second consecutive year.

2010 — Jamie McMurray’s victory in the Brickyard 400 gives owner Chip Ganassi the first team triple crown in American auto racing: winning the Daytona 500, Indianapolis 500 and the Brickyard 400 in the same year. McMurray won the season-opening Daytona 500 in February, and Ganassi IndyCar series driver Dario Franchitti won the Indy 500 in May.

2011 — The NFL Players Assn. executive board and 32 team reps vote unanimously to approve the terms of a deal to the end the 4½-month lockout. The final pact is for 10 years, without an opt-out clause.

2011 — Taylor Hoagland hits a two-run home run, Valerie Arioto and Megan Langenfeld have RBI singles and the United States beats rival Japan 6-4 to win its fifth straight World Cup of Softball championship.

2012 — Triple jumper Voula Papachristou is kicked off Greece’s Olympic team by the Hellenic Olympic Committee for her comments on Twitter mocking African immigrants and expressing support for a far-right political party.

2015 — Maya Moore scores a record 30 points to lead the West to a 117-112 victory over the East in the WNBA All-Star Game. The league’s reigning MVP scores eight straight points in the final 2 minutes to turn a one-point deficit into a 113-106 advantage.

2021 — USA’s men’s basketball lose to France 83-76 ending their 25-game Olympic winning streak.

And finally

Gil Hodges is inducted into the Hall of Fame. Watch and listen here.