LOS ANGELES -- Early April is a time for butterflies, and that is good news for the Los Angeles Dodgers.

This has nothing to do with flowers or colorful wings, though, and everything to do with a certain staff ace who knows how to embrace the internal flutter that comes with the first game of the season.

Clayton Kershaw admitted to those butterflies before his Opening Day assignment. It is all part of listening to a body clock that tells him the season has arrived and it is time to get busy. He did indeed Monday, giving up just two runs (one earned) and taking a one-hitter into the seventh inning of a 14-3 victory over the San Diego Padres.

Kershaw struck out eight, and after his seventh consecutive Opening Day assignment, he now has a 0.99 ERA on the first day of the season. Other Kershaw numbers on Opening Day: 52 strikeouts in 45⅔ innings, just six walks, 24 hits and a 0.66 WHIP.

The Dodgers have won all seven of those Opening Day games Kershaw has started.

“The day the butterflies leave, I need to find something else to do,” Kershaw said. “It means you care about what you’re doing, I think, and it’s a good feeling. Just to know that you have that adrenaline, that anxiousness to get back out there, to get that first out under your belt and kind of settle in.”

It was the Dodgers’ first game that counted since they were thoroughly dispatched by the Chicago Cubs in Game 6 of the National League Championship Series in October. The Dodgers fell 5-0 that day, and it didn’t seem that close. Kershaw was on the mound.

Much has been made of Kershaw’s postseason stumbles over the years, and in the postgame clubhouse Monday he even gave a nod to them unprompted. He was asked if this season feels more like a continuation of the season before, more than any the Dodgers have experienced.

“Yeah, I guess I never really thought about it like that, but at the same time, having that many guys back, to come as close as we did last year, to bring a majority of those guys back [from] last year, everybody remembers that,” Kershaw said. “Hopefully you gain experience from failure. I would know. So hopefully that makes us a little better this year.”

Kershaw had his patented intensity working early Monday. After Corey Seager made a first-inning throwing error, Kershaw eventually gave up a run-scoring single to Yangervis Solarte. The run was unearned, but it was on the scoreboard and Kershaw appeared to bark in frustration as the ball rolled into the outfield.

It would be the last frustration of the day, as the Dodgers offense backed Kershaw to the laugher. So many times it seems as if the Dodgers ace is in a dogfight, clinging to a slim lead or trying to keep a low-scoring game close so his club can rally.

The reality is that among pitchers with at least 50 starts, the Dodgers' 1.25-run margin of victory when Kershaw is on the mound is fourth-best in the game. Adam Wainwright leads that category at 1.46. The sporadic blowouts, though, like Monday’s and last year’s 15-0 thrashing of the Padres on Opening Day, skew the number slightly.

This one was in hand seemingly by the time Joc Pederson hit a grand slam in the third inning. Yasmani Grandal followed with his own home run, one of two on the day.

“When you have your ace going, you just try to get him a few runs and just let him take over,” Pederson said. “We were fortunate enough to put double-digits up there for him, and he took care of the rest. I wouldn’t say it’s easy for him, but he makes it look extremely easy.”

By the time the lead grew, Kershaw was Kershaw, slicing up the young Padres with ease. He carried a one-hitter into the seventh inning before Ryan Schimpf hit a towering home run.

Manager Dave Roberts removed his star pitcher soon after, giving him a relatively light day of 84 pitches, some of which were changeups that Kershaw always talks about using one day but never commits to.

For a pitcher who seems to reinvent every year, even as he dominates, Kershaw’s changeup might just be the pitch that befuddles opponents even further. Nearly every year since his debut, he has become less fastball-reliant, developing one of the game’s best sliders in the process.

Blowout victories not only would be welcome for Kershaw, they could give him more time to dial in that changeup.

“He is expecting to go out there and throw a shutout every time he takes the mound,” Roberts said. “I don’t know what the correlation is to No. 1s, that they don’t typically get that run support, and obviously they are facing No. 1s as well, if it lines up. But for Clayton, it’s nice.

“But for our guys on the offensive side, it shouldn’t matter who’s pitching. You go out there and executive a game plan, and the hitting guys had a great game plan for our offense today.”

So will this be the season baseball’s best pitcher throws the league a changeup with his new changeup?

“I think definitely you want to mix your pitches as best as you can and make sure you have everything working the way you want it to,” Kershaw said, when asked if the big lead gave him license to work on the pitch that rarely sees time in games. “At the same time, it is a big-league game and you don’t want to give away hits, you don’t want to give away outs. It’s a fine line for sure.”

If it means he has big leads, though, it might not be a line that Kershaw would object to crossing. For now, he seems content with turning butterflies into team victories.