LA Dodgers gang up on another Arizona Diamondbacks righty in 5-2 win

LOS ANGELES >> The Dodgers and Arizona Diamondbacks will play each other five more times after today. There’s still time for the Diamondbacks to change the trajectory of what’s become a predictable head-to-head narrative.

Then again, Zack Greinke and Shelby Miller might have a lot of time before they reach free agency. Acquired in the offseason to anchor the rotation of a team seemingly close to contention, the two right-handers were supposed to be leading a Diamondbacks re-surgence.

Trouble is, the Dodgers feast on right-handed pitching. So it was Tuesday, when Miller allowed five runs in 4 1/3 iings in a 5-2 Dodger win.

Greinke allowed a career-high five home runs the day before in his return to Dodger Stadium.

For a day, the Dodgers maintained their four-game margin over the San Francisco Giants in the National League West. The Giants came back to beat the Colorado Rockies earlier in the day.

With less than four weeks remaining in the season, the battle for first and second place has become the only one that matters in the NL West. The Diamondbacks buried themselves in an inescapable hole long ago. And Miller was more than partly to blame.

Acquired from Atlanta in a trade that sent Dansby Swanson, the first overall draft pick a year ago, Miller is 2-11 with a 6.89 ERA. Tuesday was his second game since returning from a month-long exile in Triple-A.

The exile appeared to do him little good. Andrew Toles, Corey Seager, Josh Reddick and Justin Turner each had two of the Dodgers’ 11 hits. The Dodgers never trailed after starter Ross Stripling (4-6) allowed an ultimately harmless run in the first iing.

Five hits — a single by Seager, a double by Turner, then singles by Reddick, Joc Pederson and Toles — allowed the Dodgers to score three runs in the third iing and pull away.

Stripling allowed two runs in five iings. He didn’t walk a batter and struck out five.

After Toles’ single in the third iing, the Diamondbacks retired 12 of the next 13 batters. The Dodgers wasted a leadoff double by Adrian Gonzalez in the fifth iing.

However, Arizona could do nothing against the Dodgers’ bullpen. Josh Fields threw a scoreless sixth iing. Pedro Baez, making his first appearance after a week in Double-A, threw a scoreless seventh. Toles sealed it with a sliding catch in left field.

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Joe Blanton set up Kenley Jansen’s 42nd save of the season with a scoreless iing of his own.

The Dodgers will face a different challenge in the series finale Wednesday when left-hander Robbie Ray takes the mound for Arizona. The Dodgers are batting .221 with a .642 on-base plus slugging percentage (OPS) against left-handed pitchers. Both figures rank last in MLB. Their .771 OPS against righties ranks sixth.