Dodger left fielder Carl Crawford

That was a spare, efficient game yesterday. A pitchers’ duel won by the Dodgers because Carl Crawford managed to hit up Kyle Lohse for two home runs.

Clayton Kershaw won the battle, though. Eight innings, four hits, 12 strikeouts. When he’s on, he’s on!

Before the game, when Jim Watson was interviewing Matt Magill about his first big-league start the night before, Watson asked Magill about when he was a kid and he came to the stadium to watch a game in the Top Deck, “where the real fans are.” Magill said he glanced up there a few times, looking for kids like he had been once. It made me miss the Top Deck even more. Curse you, Gaggenheim Partners!

Our pitchers keep dropping like flies!

Just one short month ago, the Dodgers’ problem was too many starters. They trade Aaron Harang, and then in the blink of an eye (or a rush of the mound) Zach Greinke puts his shoulder into a charge by Padre Carlos Quinton — snap, bam, alla-kazam — and Greinke is in surgery and out of the rotation for months.

No problem! We activate Chad Billingsley, who had hurt his elbow last year but swore he was all better. He pitches great … one time … then he sucks and says his elbow hurts again. Now he’s had the surgery he should have had last year, and he’s out for the next 12 months.

OK, let’s pull Chris Capuano into the rotation. Good thing we have so many starters, right? Well, he pulls something in his leg while rushing into the fracas with Quinton in San Diego, and he makes it worse running to cover first in his next start. So Cappy is gone for who knows how long.

That leaves Ted Lilly, but he hasn’t fully recovered from an injury last year, so we need to call up a minor-leaguer to fill in until Lilly is 100%. We know just the guy! Stephen Fife. He’s been good for the Dodgers in spot starts in the past. He will do the trick! And he does all right enough for the Dodgers to win the game, only the game would be his first and last of the season so far. He was put on the DL because of right-shoulder bursitis.

So where does that leave us? Ace Clayton Kershaw, new guy Hyun-Jin Ryu, iffy guy Josh Beckett and Lilly. Uh-oh. We’re a man short.

Matt Magill went 6⅔, gave up two runs on four hits and struck out seven in his Major League debut.

So straight from Albuquerque, here comes Simi Valley’s own Matt Magill, wearing the number 36, donned in the past (Thank you, Vin Scully) by such Dodger luminaries as Casey Stengel, Don Newcombe, Jeff Weaver and (my favorite short-timer) Greg Maddux. (Vin didn’t include Maddux, but I still have my “36” T-shirt from his brief stint with us.)

Welcome to the team, Magill! Live up to that number.

P.S. It wasn’t his fault the Dodgers lost in his first start. The bullpen blew it again.

I’m always happy when I’m in L.A. You know, the weather’s always good. It’s just a good place to be.”
— Matt Kemp

Center fielder Matt Kemp

Unless, of course, you’re in your car trying to go the three miles to your Echo Park home from downtown at 5:30 on Fireworks Night.

The new Dodger owners have made a lot of things better about the stadium, at least, so I’m told. But one of the things they have failed to ameliorate is the traffic.

In fact, for those of us not going to the stadium but forced to drive the roads around the ravine anyway, the traffic is worse than ever.

This good idea goes terribly wrong as game time nears.

I didn’t think it was even possible for Sunset Boulevard to get worse, but the addition of the coned-off bus lanes for the “Dodger Express” has achieved the unthinkable. Regular rush hour is bad enough, but then they take away one whole lane? It may encourage a few more folks to take public transit, but for people who have to drive for whatever reason — and for all the neighbors — this bus lane is a freaking nightmare! And because it’s usually rush hour anyway, there are no viable detours. Oh well, the walk will do me good.

Now about the game …
The back-and-forth, the timely hitting, the “Will Brandon League blow it again?” drama in the ninth. Other than Mark Ellis leaving with a hamstring pull, it was the perfect win.