The Los Angeles Dodgers defeated the Atlanta Braves 5-3 in the opening game of the National League Division Series on Saturday afternoon at their home ground.

Right fielder Kyle Tucker was at the centre of the afternoon's outcome, hitting a two-run homer in the sixth inning. Trailing by a single run at that point, Tucker drove a fastball from AJ Smith-Shawver 408 feet into the right-field seats, restoring the Dodgers' lead. A ball driven into the gap during that plate appearance extended the Dodgers' advantage by a margin that held as the final difference when the last out was recorded.

Temperatures had reached 100 degrees by the time the game got underway.

Tucker signed a $60 million annual contract with the Dodgers in the most recent offseason, a figure that stood above every other player's salary across the league. He posted a .196 batting average at home through much of the regular season. In September, he hit six home runs and drove in 13 runs, recording an on-base-plus-slugging mark of .969 across the month.

Manager Dave Roberts spoke about the difficulties Tucker had faced over the course of the season, noting that the player deserved credit for staying present through those difficulties rather than stepping away from them, and that he had ultimately worked through to the other side. Roberts also addressed what the postseason means for the team, stating that a championship is the only outcome that matters. He noted that postseason performances tend to leave a lasting impression on the fanbase.

Tarik Skubal, who joined the Dodgers from Detroit on August 2, covered six innings on the mound during his opening postseason appearance with the club. Of the batters Skubal faced, seven were retired via strikeout and two reached base on balls, with a pair of hits and a solo home run — the source of his only run allowed — accounting for the plate appearances that went against him. Skubal retired 15 consecutive batters during one stretch of the game, and through the first five innings he ran the count to three balls on a single hitter only once.

Kiké Hernández hit a two-run home run in the fourth inning to put the Dodgers on the board first, bringing his cumulative RBI total across the three most recent postseason runs to 27. A solo home run off Max Muncy's bat in the sixth inning stretched the Dodgers' advantage to 5-1.

With two runners aboard in the final frame, Ozzie Albies connected off Tanner Scott for a home run that brought the Dodgers' lead down to 5-3. Scott was pulled from the game, and Ryan Phillips entered to close out the inning, retiring the final batter to preserve the victory.

Atlanta entered the contest having relied entirely on relief pitching across the opening eight frames of their wild-card series against Philadelphia. Whether Chris Sale — who could be working on short rest — will take the mound for Game 2 on Sunday had not been determined ahead of the contest.

Attention ahead of the game also turned to the pitching sequence the Dodgers had settled on: Skubal assigned to the opening game, Blake Snell to the second, and Yoshinobu Yamamoto — whose postseason ledger stood at seven wins against no losses alongside a 2.25 ERA — slotted into the third. The arrangement was driven in part by the ability to pitch Skubal twice across the series on full rest, while Yamamoto's longer recovery window would have limited him to a single outing regardless of where he was placed in the rotation. Slotting Yamamoto into a later position on the NLDS roster would also leave him available to start twice should the team advance to the National League Championship Series.

Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman spoke to reporters about the pitching roster, describing the group heading into October as the deepest the organisation had assembled at that point in the year, while noting that some difficult roster decisions had left certain players off the final list.

Shohei Ohtani and Freddie Freeman collected just two hits between them — a single apiece — across seven plate appearances. Ohtani, dealing with both arm and leg injuries, posted a .157 batting average from August 18 onward without hitting a home run in that stretch. Speaking through interpreter Will Ireton, he told reporters that the physical issues were ones he would need to keep managing going forward.

After one game, the Dodgers hold a 1-0 advantage in the five-game series.