ANAHEIM, Calif. (AP) — Roki Sasaki's eventful major league career finally appears to be going the way most everyone expected when he joined the Los Angeles Dodgers at the start of last season.

Sasaki pitched a career-high seven innings of four-hit ball in a 10-1 victory over the Los Angeles Angels on Sunday, turning in the longest and most dominant start of his strange tenure in blue.

The 24-year-old right-hander racked up a career-best eight strikeouts with no walks, doing it all with a burgeoning confidence he lacked for most of last season. Sasaki (2-3) repeatedly baffled the Halos while attacking the strike zone with a 98 mph fastball and his proliferating selection of breaking pitches.

“I think he has confidence in who he is as a big league pitcher, and we’re seeing some of the fruits right now,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said.

Although he did it against the team with the worst record in the majors, Sasaki's stuff is clearly working at a high level he has rarely reached as a starter stateside.

He was already a ballyhooed young star in January 2025 when he chose the Dodgers as his big league home for at least the next six years. But after a rookie season in which almost nothing went as planned, Sasaki has only recently shown why every team in the majors wanted him in their rotation.

“I actually felt better in my last outing, but today I felt able to throw strikes a little bit more,” Sasaki said through his interpreter. “Also the offense did a great job of scoring a lot of runs.”

Sasaki hasn't been dominant in most of his starts, but Roberts said he is clearly trending upward. He is also working well with catcher Dalton Rushing, who received credit from Roberts for calling an outstanding game at Angel Stadium.

“He looked really good today,” Rushing said. “Obviously it’s really good momentum for him to carry forward, but at the same time, there’s opportunities for him to be even better. We know that’s not his ceiling. What he just did is obviously the best we’ve seen him to this point, but I trust that guy has got a lot more in the tank, and we’re going to continue to push. But it was fun to watch.”

Sasaki is again trying to carve out a permanent spot in the Dodgers' rotation this season after famously failing to do so as a rookie. He subsequently missed 4 1/2 months with shoulder problems, but improbably returned as Los Angeles' closer during its playoff run to a second straight World Series title.

Sasaki's success as a reliever was a lifesaver for the short-handed Dodgers, but it didn't change their long-term plans for him. Sasaki returned to spring training as a rotation member again — but then he repeatedly pitched poorly in Arizona and damaged his confidence.

Exactly half the batters he faced in spring exhibitions reached base, and Sasaki struggled for any control.

Roberts said the Dodgers' message to Sasaki has been consistent: Stop worrying about minor mechanical tweaks or fine-tuning new pitches, and simply attack the strike zone with your already formidable talent.

It took a while for Sasaki to hear it, but now it's loud and clear — and it turns out his aggressiveness is also improving his delivery. Sasaki generated 18 swing-and-misses from the Angels, a big factor in his career-high strikeout total.

“I think one of the reasons is mechanical,” Sasaki said of his recent success. “Things are kind of clicking, and I was able to execute really well throughout the game today.”

The Dodgers need Sasaki to be sharp as they attempt to get through yet another year of major pitching injuries. High-priced starters Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow are out once again, and closer Edwin Diaz is also on the shelf along with Jack Dreyer, their most-used reliever.

Los Angeles is still pitching superbly, going into the weekend with the third-lowest ERA in the majors. Rushing and Roberts both expect Sasaki to be a big part of the effort to keep it that way.

“Pretty much it’s a confidence thing,” Rushing said. "He needs to trust his stuff, understand how good his stuff is, and execute. ... With the stuff he has, it’s easy to miss barrels, and we hadn’t quite got to see that just yet. Today was obviously a big step forward.”

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INGLEWOOD, Calif. (AP) — Mike Perry beat Nate Diaz in a two-round welterweight brawl Saturday night on the undercard of Ronda Rousey's comeback fight against Gina Carano.

Perry (15-8) earned his first victory in mixed martial arts since June 2020 with 10 minutes of steady punishment for the 41-year-old Diaz (21-14), who had been away from the MMA cage for nearly four years. Perry was quicker and more active than Diaz, whose face and chest were covered in blood during the second round.

Perry threw a flying knee that sent Diaz sprawling at the second-round bell, and referee Mike Beltran waved off the fight moments later in agreement with Diaz's corner.

“He's the toughest guy out there,” Perry said about Diaz, who was the vocal crowd favorite in his native California. “There's no quit in him. ... The entire crowd was cheering for him so loud.”

Veteran heavyweight star Francis Ngannou finished Philipe Lins in the first round of just his second MMA fight in four years, and the former UFC champion immediately teased the possibility of a boxing match with promoter Jake Paul — or an MMA bout with fellow superstar Jon Jones, who also attended the show.

Earlier, former UFC heavyweight champion Junior Dos Santos was brutally knocked out by Cuba's Robelis Despaigne in the first round of the first fight of the main card.

Perry had been away from MMA for five years after his UFC career crashed with six losses in nine bouts, and he subsequently lost a boxing match to Paul. But Perry had too much power and precision for Diaz, who made his reputation in his two famous brawls with Conor McGregor a decade ago.

“Yeah, I had blood in my eye and I couldn't see, so it was all good,” Diaz said of the stoppage.

Ngannou exchanged strikes and clinches with Lins before finishing the Brazilian with a sweeping left hand to the head in the final minute of the first round.

Ngannou then engaged in some promotional banter with Paul, who has made a boxing career out of beating martial artists. Jones watched the proceedings from Netflix's commentary stage at Intuit Dome, and he told the broadcasters that he would fight Ngannou if he could get out of his UFC contract.

Ngannou won the UFC belt in 2021 and unified it in 2022 before walking away from the world's dominant MMA promotion. He had taken just one MMA bout since then, and he lost two big-money boxing matches to British heavyweight stars Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua in Saudi Arabia.

The 42-year-old Dos Santos' first MMA bout since 2024 ended disastrously when Despaigne caught him with a three-punch combo that left Dos Santos senseless on the canvas. Dos Santos won the UFC title in 2011 by beating Cain Velasquez in a 64-second fight that was the highlight of his successful 20-year career, but he has lost six of his past eight fights.

French lightweight Salahdine Parnasse made an impressive U.S. debut with a first-round stoppage of Kenneth Cross. Parnasse, who had fought exclusively for a Poland-based promotion since 2017, expertly battered Cross with dozens of standup strikes and controlled him on the ground before using body shots to finish.

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