PITTSBURGH (AP) — Dodgers two-way star Shohei Ohtani hit his 13th homer of the season before leaving the game due to left knee inflammation and Los Angeles beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 8-6 on Thursday night.
The reigning NL MVP hit a solo homer in the third inning. He also had a single and walked twice, reaching base in all four of his plate appearances before being lifted for a pinch hitter in the seventh inning.
It was not immediately clear when Ohtani began feeling discomfort in the knee.
Dodgers starter Justin Wrobleski left the game in the fifth inning with a left hamstring contusion. The left-hander was hit by a line drive off the bat of Bryan Reynolds. The ball ricocheted off Wrobleski to first baseman Freddie Freeman. Wrobleski collided with Reynolds while taking Freeman’s toss at first base.
Andy Pages also had two hits for the NL West-leading Dodgers, who took two of three in the series. Kyle Tucker hit a two-run single, and Miguel Rojas drove in two more runs.
Pirates rookie Rafael Flores Jr. hit his first MLB home run, and Brandon Lowe also went deep. Flores, Nick Gonzales and Spencer Horwitz had two hits apiece.
Wrobleski allowed four runs in 4 2/3 innings. Mitch Keller (5-4) was tagged for five runs in four innings.
Jack Dreyer (3-1) pitched a scoreless seventh inning and Tanner Scott got the last four outs for his seventh save.
Dodgers: RHP Roki Sasaki (4-3, 4.03 ERA) pitches against White Sox LHP Anthony Kay (5-1, 4.40) on Friday night in Chicago.
Pirates: Host Miami on Friday night with RHP Braxton Ashcraft (5-3, 3.28 ERA) facing Marlins RHP Sandy Alcantara (5-4, 4.33).
AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb
Pittsburgh Pirates' Brandon Lowe watches his two-run home run off Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Justin Wrobleski during the fifth inning of a baseball game in Pittsburgh, Thursday, June 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Justin Wrobleski delivers during the first inning of a baseball game against the Pittsburgh Pirates in Pittsburgh, Thursday, June 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Los Angeles Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani (17) watches his solo home run off Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Mitch Keller during the third inning of a baseball game in Pittsburgh, Thursday, June 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
ATMORE, Ala. (AP) — An Alabama man facing the death penalty by nitrogen gas was spared Thursday as the U.S. Supreme Court refused to set aside a lower-court ruling that found the method is unconstitutionally cruel, issuing a brief order that came well after the hour originally planned to initiate Jeffery Lee’s execution.
The justices decided not to lift an injunction blocking Alabama from carrying out what would have been the nation’s ninth execution by nitrogen gas, rejecting a last-minute legal battle by the state as it sought to carry out the sentence in the evening. A spokesperson for the Alabama Department of Corrections said the execution was off for the evening and the state would not try another method.
The high court voted 6-3 and did not explain its reasoning. Three of the conservative justices — Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch — said they would grant Alabama’s request to lift the injunction and let the execution go forward.
“While I am disappointed the Supreme Court did not allow the state to proceed with Lee’s chosen method of execution, I remain committed to ensuring that justice is ultimately served for his victims,” Gov. Kay Ivey said.
In a statement the legal team for Lee, 49, hailed the decision and noted that his jury had voted for a sentence of life, which a judge overruled.
“His jury voted for life. Two courts ruled the method unconstitutional. Today, the Constitution prevailed,” the statement said. “Now Governor Ivey can finish what the jury started: restore the jury’s verdict of life without parole.”
The ruling was at least a temporary, rare victory for opponents of capital punishment in a state that has had one of the busiest death chambers in the country. And it capped an extraordinary legal back-and-forth over the humaneness of nitrogen gas as an execution method.
Lee filed a lawsuit challenging Alabama’s protocol as a violation of the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment, and U.S. District Judge Emily Marks ruled the method constitutional in May.
But a three-judge panel from the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed her decision Monday, saying the three minutes it could take for an inmate to lose awareness is an “intolerable” time frame “given the suffering that would likely take place under Alabama’s nitrogen hypoxia protocol.”
Marks reevaluated the case and ruled again Tuesday saying Lee had shown “that the protocol constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment.” The state appealed to the Supreme Court.
“If that ruling stands, it would be unprecedented in American history. Not only does it portend the first-ever permanent ban on a legislatively enacted method, but it would expand the concept of cruelty well beyond the bounds of the Eighth Amendment,” lawyers with the Alabama Attorney General’s Office wrote.
Lee’s lawyers asked the high court to keep the execution on hold, saying in a response that Alabama was asking it to intervene at the eleventh hour “to allow an execution that has been found unconstitutional to proceed.”
Prison officials said Lee did not request a final meal Thursday but had potato chips, Skittles, water and a Sprite in the hours ahead of his possible execution.
Marks did not block the state from executing Lee with one of the other approved methods, the electric chair or lethal injection. It is unclear how quickly the state could switch, however.
Alabama began using nitrogen gas to carry out some executions in 2024. The method involves strapping a respirator to a person’s face and replacing breathable air with pure nitrogen gas, causing death from lack of oxygen.
Nitrogen has been used in eight executions in the United States — seven times in Alabama and once in Louisiana. Lee was scheduled to be the ninth.
During the previous Alabama nitrogen executions, the inmates shook, pulled at the restraints and exhibited labored breathing. During the state’s last execution by nitrogen gas, 30 minutes elapsed between Anthony Boyd exhibiting signs of being impacted by the gas and state officials closing the curtain to the viewing room to signal the execution was complete.
The state has maintained that the method is constitutional and causes no more suffering than other execution methods.
Lee, who is currently housed at William C. Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, was convicted of two counts of capital murder for killing Jimmy Ellis and Elaine Thompson while robbing a pawnshop on Dec. 12, 1998.
Prosecutors said Lee entered Jimmy’s Pawnshop with a sawed-off shotgun and shot Ellis, the owner, and Thompson, an employee.
A jury voted 7-5 to give Lee a sentence of life imprisonment. However a judge overrode that and sentenced him to death.
Alabama ended the practice of judicial override in 2017 and no longer allows a judge to disregard a jury’s sentencing decision in death penalty cases.
Bestselling author John Grisham called on Gov. Ivey to honor the jury's decision and commute Lee's sentence to life without parole.
“The practice of a judge overriding a jury was declared unconstitutional and so indefensible that Alabama itself abolished it in 2017,” Grisham said in a statement. “Jeffery Lee’s jury made its decision, the Alabama Legislature later agreed that juries, not judges, should decide life or death sentences.”
This undated photo provided by the Alabama Department of Corrections on Thursday, June 11, 2026, shows Jeffery Lee, who was sentenced to death for killing two people during a 1998 robbery at a pawn shop. (Alabama Department of Corrections via AP)
Protesters gather outside the Capitol in Montgomery, Ala., on Monday, June 8, 2026, to oppose an upcoming execution in Alabama. (AP Photo/Kim Chandler)
This undated photo from the Alabama Department of Corrections shows Jeffery Lee, who was sentenced to death for killing two people during a 1998 robbery at a pawn shop. (Alabama Department of Corrections via AP)
Abraham Bonowitz, of the group Death Penalty Action, leads a demonstration outside the Capitol in Montgomery, Ala., on Monday, June 8, 2026, to oppose an upcoming execution in Alabama. (AP Photo/Kim Chandler)
