Category: Baseball

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LOS ANGELES — The scene was all too familiar. The smoke from the pregame pyrotechnics in center field had barely lifted, the reverberations from the flyover of the F-35 jets before first pitch had barely stopped and the twirling of the blue rally towels had barely ended when the pomp and circumstance of Game 1 of the National League Division Series at Dodger Stadium suddenly ceased. 

For the second straight postseason, a division foe plated multiple runs before the Dodgers had taken a single October swing. Again, a shaky rotation threatened to sap the energy from a buzzing building and derail another season. An unease enveloped a stadium full of more than 53,000 fans, who had seen this movie before. 

This time, though, a new character was introduced to the production. 

This time, however decimated the pitching staff, however miserable the start, however slim the chances are with a tattered rotation, it feels like there might be hope.

This time, there’s Shohei Ohtani. 

“We’ve obviously had a lot of good players,” manager Dave Roberts said. “But when you get a player like Shohei, who clearly embraces these moments and has the ability to carry a ballclub, I do think that there’s something to alleviating the … I hate saying pressure, but the pressure for other players.”

A year after allowing six runs in the top of the first inning in a dismal start to the 2023 National League Division Series against the Diamondbacks, the Dodgers made progress in the opening frame; they surrendered three. 

Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s major-league playoff debut began much like his major-league debut. Facing the same Padres opponent that pummeled the former NPB star for five runs in one inning in Korea back in March, an unforgiving San Diego lineup plated three runs within the first four batters of Saturday’s Game 1, capped by a stadium-silencing two-run shot from Manny Machado. 

It felt like déjà vu, especially after the Dodgers failed to respond in the bottom of the frame despite two runners on base. 

The start was reminiscent not only of last postseason, when the wild-card D-backs outscored the Dodgers by 13 runs over the course of a three-game sweep, but also the year prior, when the wild-card Padres stunned the 111-win Dodgers in the 2022 NLDS. Two years ago, a fearsome L.A. lineup cratered with runners in scoring position. Last year, the offense cratered in general, scoring just two runs in every game. 

This year, Ohtani might have exorcised the offensive demons of postseasons past with one game-tying three-run swing. 

“We don’t expect anything less than that,” Teoscar Hernández said. “He’s the guy that’s going to guide us through all this.”

Ohtani had a .628 batting average with six homers, six doubles and 20 RBI over his last 10 games of the regular season. With runners in scoring position during that stretch, he was 12-for-14 with five homers. Entering the first playoff game of his career, he said he was not nervous. Playing in important games, being the person to deliver in the most important situations, this was his childhood dream.

There was no bigger situation in his big-league career than Saturday’s second inning. 

The second at-bat of Ohtani’s postseason career began with the two-time — and likely soon-to-be three-time — MVP fouling a 2-0 pitch off his knee. With two on and two out, Ohtani composed himself. 

All week, the Dodgers had stressed the importance of hitting the fastball, something they had failed to do each of the past two postseasons. Last year, the Dodgers hit .268 and slugged .480 against fastballs in the regular season. In the playoffs, those numbers dropped to .169 and .262, respectively, which ranked last and second to last among playoff clubs. 

It was a similar story in the 2022 NLDS against the Padres. The Dodgers ranked in the top three in MLB in batting average and slugging against fastballs during the regular season. In the playoffs, they hit .192 and slugged .342 with a 27.7% whiff rate against the pitch, which ranked second worst among postseason clubs. 

“Whether it’s timing, the time off, I don’t really know what the answer is in terms of the why,” president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman said. 

They attempted to combat those issues during the five days off before the start of the NLDS this year, altering the structure of their practices and preparation. They favored a more gradual ramp-up in intensity rather than day after day of sim games, and they did more work with velocity machines. 

On Saturday, it paid off. 

“Three runs can kind of knock the air out of you,” Freddie Freeman said. “But when you have Shohei Ohtani, that always helps. Just, when you need a big hit or a big situation comes up, we had the right guy at the plate.”

After the painful foul ball, Ohtani turned on a 96.9 mph four-seamer from Dylan Cease at the top of the zone and laced a no-doubt shot 111.8 mph off the bat. He flung his bat emphatically to the side before letting out a scream on the game-tying blast. Ohtani beamed. The crowd erupted. The Dodgers’ bullpen did, too. 

“We were going nuts,” said reliever Alex Vesia, one of five Dodgers relievers who held the Padres to two hits over six scoreless innings after an early departure from Yamamoto. “There was life.” 

Two years ago, Roberts lamented that his Dodgers team didn’t seem to match the energy or the intensity of the Padres team in the other dugout. At least to begin the NLDS, that wasn’t an issue. 

“I think there’s something to having that superstar player that can carry a ballclub,” Roberts said. 

The rest of the lineup seemed to feed off of Ohtani’s pressure-relieving blast. In the third inning, the effort went further than anyone would have asked. 

Freddie Freeman was iffy to play in Game 1 after injuring his ankle. He told his son Charlie when he left the house that he wasn’t sure he would be able to go. He did some pregame work, got off the field and hit off the Trajekt velocity machine to see how he would handle something faster than typical batting practice. When he was hitting line drives off the machine, he felt like he was good enough to contribute. 

He not only recorded two hits but also stole a base, making his manager hold his breath in the process. 

“Ninety feet means a lot in this game, especially in postseason,” Freeman said. “I know I took a big risk with how I’m feeling, but there’s just an opportunity that presented itself, and I had to go for it. If I can’t play the game the right way, I shouldn’t be out there. I was feeling good enough, adrenaline took over. Adrenaline’s worn off now.” 

The Dodgers didn’t score that inning, but seeing Freeman’s effort provided a boost, too. 

“He could’ve waited a couple more days,” shortstop Miguel Rojas, who’s playing through a tear in his adductor, said. “The series, it’s not like we’re going home today. But you see the importance of a guy like Freddie being on the field, running all over the place and knowing what he had to go through, it pushed me to kind of forget about everything that is going with me because it’s not even close to what he’s going through.”

When the Padres jumped ahead again by two runs, the Dodgers responded with three runs in the fourth — including a go-ahead hit by Hernández — and another in the fifth. The first three batters in their lineup reached base seven times. The bottom of the lineup carried its weight, too. Will Smith, Gavin Lux, Tommy Edman and Rojas combined to reach base seven times. 

The offensive onslaught helped the Dodgers overcome a three-inning start from Yamamoto. Stunningly, that outing represented an improvement from the Dodgers’ previous three postseason starts. In their past four postseason games dating back to last year, Dodgers starting pitchers have gone a combined 7.2 innings while allowing 18 runs on 21 hits and five walks with only three strikeouts. 

They rebuilt their rotation in the winter to try to better withstand the rigors of a season, and it didn’t matter. Tyler Glasnow won’t be returning this year. Neither will Gavin Stone, nor Dustin May, River Ryan or Emmet Sheehan. On Saturday, more grim news came on the pitching front when Clayton Kershaw revealed that an MRI on his injured toe showed that he had made his injury worse. He won’t be returning this year, either. 

Considering the state of their rotation, it stands to reason the Dodgers will need to outhit and outslug their opponents to outlast them throughout October. It’s a dangerous way to live, but it has to be the blueprint to success.

With Ohtani leading the offense, it feels like it just might work. 

“I just really have never seen a guy in the biggest of moments come through as consistently as he has,” Roberts said. “I don’t know how he does it.” 

Rowan Kavner is an MLB writer for FOX Sports. He previously covered the L.A. Dodgers, LA Clippers and Dallas Cowboys. An LSU grad, Rowan was born in California, grew up in Texas, then moved back to the West Coast in 2014. Follow him on Twitter at @RowanKavner.

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PHILADELPHIA — Zack Wheeler gave the Phillies everything they asked for. 

After 111 pitches and seven shutout innings behind him, Wheeler was hardly breaking a sweat on the mound. After two hours of pitching, he looked like he would have no problem if he was asked to keep going. Really, letting Wheeler pitch until he was actually being threatened would’ve been the Phillies‘ best chance at winning the opener of the National League Division Series. 

Because the moment Wheeler came out, the Mets pounced on the Phillies and comfortably took Game 1, 6-2, at Citizens Bank Park.

“Wheeler is nasty,” Mets designated hitter J.D. Martinez said. “He’s one of the best pitchers in the league, and you could see it. Especially in the shadows early on, it’s like, dude, this guy is throwing airplanes up there. The ball’s taking off every which way. It’s like, good luck. 

“You just gotta take him out of the game. You gotta find a way to get him out because the way he was throwing the ball today, it was just unhittable.”

But allowing Wheeler to pitch beyond the 110-pitch threshold was already a tenuous situation. Sure, manager Rob Thomson could’ve given him the eighth so that the Phillies had the chance to steal one or two more outs from their ace. But the most pitches he has thrown in a start this season (115) came in an outing against the Marlins in June. On Saturday, in his 33rd start of the year, after Wheeler had already dominated and walked off the mound with a one-run lead, having him come back out for another inning might have been asking for too much. 

In hindsight, perhaps they should’ve asked him anyway. 

After Wheeler struck out nine, walked four and allowed just one hit across seven shutout innings, the Mets immediately rallied for their third playoff win in five days (and fourth dramatic road win in six days if you count their comeback versus Atlanta this past Monday to clinch a playoff berth). Saturday’s late-game ambush featured one productive at-bat after another, as six of the first eight batters singled or walked against three different Phillies relievers in the eighth inning. The two that didn’t reach base hit sacrifice flies, as New York pushed five runs across the board.

It sealed another improbable postseason victory for the Mets, who overcame a hostile Philly environment and a bullpen game that started off with Kodai Senga giving up a home run to his first batter, Kyle Schwarber. 

That the Phillies only scraped together two hits while Wheeler was on the mound, pitching a postseason gem that only added to his reputation as one of the best pitchers in baseball, was a waste. The Phillies were well-rested after winning the division and earning a bye week. They had the home-field advantage behind a sold-out crowd of 45,751. They had their ace throwing fastballs at 99 mph, four ticks higher than his season average, and getting redemption against his former team, which let him walk away in free agency. 

Saturday was all lined up for the Phillies to finish the job. Instead, the Mets have backed them into somewhat of a corner. The Phillies must win Game 2 at the Bank before the series turns over to yet another contentious environment at Citi Field, where the Mets will gain another edge, another upper hand, that they haven’t even needed to reach this point.

“I do believe in momentum,” Mets outfielder Brandon Nimmo said. “And I believe that, you know, we have confidence right now. We have recent examples of coming back. I believe in the hard work that we’ve done and I believe in the preparation that these guys do each and every day.

“But momentum is a big thing. And having confidence is a big thing. And the guys are showing a lot of that right now.”

The Mets are surely feeling confident after stealing a win in a game started by Wheeler, who has established himself over the past three years as the best big-game pitcher in baseball. His Game 1 performance lowered his career postseason ERA to 2.18 across 12 appearances, which is the type of production that puts him in the conversation with the game’s best postseason starters in recent memory. 

There are only so many starting pitchers that, in a playoff game when stakes are the highest they will ever be, the manager can trust with a strong sense of certainty that, not only will Wheeler pitch deep into his outing, not only will he save the arms in the bullpen, but he won’t spiral, either. Wheeler is excellent at avoiding the horrible meltdown inning — the exact situations that allow opposing teams to rally and put up a crooked number in the postseason. 

But Wheeler, typically emotionless, stone-faced, and a cool customer, is a workhorse who has mastered the art of making adjustments, even as he gets older. In his age-34 season, while speed can tend to be valued over stuff, Wheeler still dominates while throwing a fastball that is ranked in the 67th percentile among his peers. 

Wheeler finished the 2024 regular season with a 2.57 ERA (second-best in the NL, after Chris Sale) in 32 starts and 200 innings. It was the sixth time in his 10-year career he pitched at least 180 innings. Asked if this season was his best shot at a Cy Young, Wheeler pondered.

“I guess I could’ve said that about 2021, too, because that was my best season,” he told FOX Sports in September. “I was like, man, that was a really good season. That was cool. Maybe that was my best shot at getting it the Cy, and then I had a better year this year. I don’t know. Maybe I can do it again. It’s hard to do, but maybe.”

Though he has yet to win one, Wheeler has been a perennial Cy Young contender since joining the Phillies in 2020. And nights like Saturday are a big reason why the Phillies have been title contenders three years in a row now.

“Nationally, you’d love him to have it [the Cy Young award]. But from our own perspective, from the city of Philadelphia and the team, he’s regarded that way,” Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski recently told FOX Sports. “He’s also pitched in the biggest spotlight, and he has shined. 

“So for him, it’s a situation where he has really established himself as one of the best pitchers, and one of the best big-time pitchers in the game. They’re two different things.” 

Wheeler likely won’t get into the Hall of Fame because of how much injury sidelined him for the first half of his career. But he sure is pitching like he belongs in Cooperstown. Leading Philly to a World Series title would be a lovely consolation. 

The Phillies, now 6-6 in Wheeler’s postseason outings, just have to stop wasting his precious gems.

Deesha Thosar is an MLB reporter for FOX Sports. She previously covered the Mets as a beat reporter for the New York Daily News. The daughter of Indian immigrants, Deesha grew up on Long Island and now lives in Queens. Follow her on Twitter at @DeeshaThosar.

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