Amazing Clayton Kershaw has Dodgers and fans singing a different tune

It has become the Dodgers greatest hit, Hollywood’s hottest record, the soundtrack to living baseball history, and it flowed again Thursday night at scorching cool Chavez Ravine.

“Tonight, we are young. So let’s set the world on fire. We can burn brighter, than the sun.”

The name of the band is Fun. The title of the song is “We Are Young.”

Burning brighter than the sun, for his 250th start as a Dodger, was Clayton Kershaw.

“His hand was touched by God,” teammate Ross Stripling said.

It is a hand that again touched Los Angeles like Kobe Bryant once touched this town, a left hand that again yanked the Dodgers out their misfortunes and made Dodger Stadium sing again.

His trademark introduction song played shortly after 7 p.m. here Thursday as Kershaw took the mound against the New York Mets.

His trademark first-strikeout-of-a-poor-lunging-soul occurred about two minutes later.

His trademark victory was all but sealed by 7:30 after the Dodgers gave him a four-run cushion and he proceeded to beat the Mets about the head and shoulders with it, giving up three hits and striking out 13 in a 5-0 victory.

“You think he’s done it all, then he comes out and amazes you again,” catcher Yasmani Grandal said.

He entered the game amazingly in a bit of a shadow, with other National League pitchers hogging the headlines.

Jake Arrieta is unbeatable in Chicago. Max Scherzer is striking out 20 in Washington. Stephen Strasburg is signing for $175 million with the Nationals. Kershaw was sixth in the league ERA. He was tied for fourth in wins. He was even second in strikeouts.

Kershaw was seemingly in the background, and then he wasn’t, requiring barely two hours to storm back into the spotlight, where he belongs, where he has seemingly always been.

“Every pitch he throws, it’s like he’s angry,” Stripling said. “Every pitch has such conviction and purpose.”

In doing so, he racked up numbers filled with that same conviction and purpose.

It was a win after a Dodgers loss — in Kershaw’s nine-year career here he has won an amazing 69% of his decisions after a loss, going 56-25 with a 2.29 ERA.

Has any pitcher been more of an ace during that time? Anyone? Anywhere?

“It’s always good that you never want to get on a streak,” he said afterward, his scraggly beard dripping from fighting through 109 pitches, his left arm red from bags of ice. “Any time you can get a win and get a series split against a good team like that, it goes a long way. ... Hopefully it kind of carries over.”

He had 13 strikeouts and just one first-inning walk, giving him 47 strikeouts and one walk in his last four starts, and a stunning 77 strikeouts and just four walks for the season.

“Walking guys is how you get in trouble,” Kershaw said. “I make them swing the bats to beat me. I’m going to hopefully attack them.”

Oh, how he attacked, from a strikeout of the game’s leadoff hitter, Curtis Granderson, to a strikeout of the game’s last hitter, Eric Campbell. He grunted and groaned and grimaced and snarled and spun the Mets hitters into a staggering mess.

His 100th pitch was a thrashing strikeout by Lucas Duda that was so confusing, Duda looked at home plate umpire Fieldin Culbreth for help.

His 104th pitch was a curveball that froze Granderson into a frustrated shake of the head.

His final pitch fooled Campbell into a weak swing and a quick stare at the scoreboard — yeah, he had just been punched out by a 73-mph curveball.

With fans in the half-empty stands screaming and stomping, Kershaw sheepishly smiled and shook the hand of Grandal.

“That’s the goal,” Kershaw said. “Shake the catcher’s hand.”

He has now set a Dodgers record with double-digit strikeouts in five consecutive starts. More impressive, perhaps, is that dating back to last year, the Dodgers have won 14 of the last 16 games he has pitched. Two seasons ago, they had a streak of 20-1 in those games.

Of course, they are 4-9 with Kershaw on the mound in the postseason, but that is a burden he will bear in October.

For now, he is once again brilliant in carrying them there.

“It was special,” Manager Dave Roberts said. “I definitely put my fan hat on tonight.”

It was so special, even when things were weird, they were good.

The analytical Dodgers decided to replace Kershaw’s personal catcher A.J. Ellis with Grandal even though Kershaw had a 1.43 ERA with Ellis in six starts this year while he had a 5.62 ERA in two starts with Grandal.

The reason was clearly offense: “This matchup with Bartolo [Colon], I like Yasi up there,” Roberts said.

The reasoning was potentially offensive: Why on earth would the Dodgers ever mess with anything that would make their ace happy?

But it turns out, the reasoning was perfect, as Grandal drove a 2-and-0 pitch into the empty upper level of the right-center field pavilion in the first inning for a three-run homer to give the Dodgers that 4-0 lead and essentially end the game.

It was officially over nine innings later when the Dodger Stadium speakers blared Clayton Kershaw’s other trademark song

“I Love L.A.”

bill.plaschke@latimes.com

Twitter: @billplaschke

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