Dodgers’ Teoscar Hernández says ‘nobody to blame but myself’ for his role in weird NLCS double play

MILWAUKEE — Teoscar Hernández watched a replay of that bizarre double play from the National League Championship Series opener only one time as the clip went viral across social media.

No further viewings were needed.

“I saw it once,” the Dodgers’ outfielder said after Los Angeles overcame the 8-6-2 double play in a 2-1 win over the Milwaukee Brewers. “Once the play was over, I realized I just (messed) up. Just one of those things that you don’t have to see it over and over to realize that you made a mistake.”

Hernández earned some redemption by hitting a home run in the second inning of the Dodgers’ 5-1 victory in Game 2.

In Game 1, Hernández walked to start the fourth inning. He was on third with the bases loaded and one out when Max Muncy hit a drive that appeared to be heading over the center-field wall.

Milwaukee’s Sal Frelick tried to rob Muncy of a grand slam, and the ball popped out of his glove and hit the top of the wall before the center fielder caught it in the air.

Los Angeles’ other runners scrambled back to their bases, thinking Frelick made the catch on a fly. Hernández still had plenty of time to tag up and score, but he hesitated and didn’t head home fast enough. Frelick threw to shortstop Joey Ortiz, who relayed to catcher William Contreras for a force out at the plate.

Contreras then completed the double play by jogging to third base and forcing out Will Smith, who was on second when the play started.

“It was one of those plays that, if you would have asked me two days ago what would you do in this situation, I would say as soon as the ball touched the glove, I would go,” Hernández said. “But in the moment, I got blocked, I think, and there’s not an explanation. I just (messed) up. It’s that simple.

“I don’t think there’s going to be any explanation that is going to be accurate. I saw it when the ball hit the glove. I went. Then I saw it bounced off the glove. And I just reacted bad. Just one of those moments, you block your mind. But there’s nobody to blame but myself. And it happens.”

Ortiz was asked whether he had watched a replay and noticed anything that wasn’t immediately apparent at the time it happened.

“Sal did make a pretty funny face,” Ortiz said. “That’s all over the social media right now. … But, no, I’ve never seen a play like that. It was a pretty crazy play to be involved in.”

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said after Game 1 that Hernández simply froze for a moment.

“Teo knows the rule. I think right there he had just a little bit of a brain fart, appreciating that when it does hit the glove, you can tag (up) there,” Roberts said. “But then he tagged, did it correctly, then saw he didn’t catch it, (and) he went back. That was the mistake. But he owned it. And after that, there’s nothing else you can do about it.”

On the official scoring, Muncy grounded into a double play on a 404-foot drive that never touched the ground. There had not been an 8-6-2 double play in the postseason over the last 35 years, the Elias Sports Bureau said. Those type of official scoring details are not always clear in records going back any further.

The most recent 8-6-2 double play in the regular season involved a ball hit by Cubs slugger Sammy Sosa to Cincinnati center fielder Ken Griffey Jr. in April 2004 — though that one ended with a tag at the plate.

Max Muncy sets Dodgers record by hitting his 14th career postseason homer

MILWAUKEE — Los Angeles Dodgers slugger Max Muncy set a franchise record by hitting his 14th career postseason homer in Game 2 of the National League Championship Series against the Milwaukee Brewers.

Muncy’s 412-foot drive over the center-field wall in the sixth inning broke the Dodgers mark he had shared with Justin Turner and Corey Seager. The solo shot off starter Freddy Peralta extended Los Angeles’ lead to 3-1.

The Dodgers went on to win 5-1 to take a 2-0 lead in the best-of-seven series.

“It means a lot to me,” Muncy said. “The Dodgers are a franchise that have been around for a very, very long time. A lot of very successful players have played in this organization. And to be able to break that record is kind of huge for me.

“But the biggest thing I would say is it speaks to the fact that I’ve had a chance to play in so many postseason games. And that’s the biggest thing about being a Dodger. You know you’ll have a chance in October to play meaningful baseball games. To be able to have that chance every single year I’ve been here, that’s always been the most important thing to me. You get as many chances as you can to win that World Series. That’s the reason why you play this game.”

It was Muncy’s 70th postseason game with the Dodgers. Turner played 86 for Los Angeles from 2014-22. Seager appeared in 61 from 2015-21.

Muncy nearly set the team record in Game 1 when he hit a long drive to center that was inches from becoming a grand slam. That shot instead turned into an unusual 8-6-2 double play after the ball popped out of center fielder Sal Frelick’s glove.

Frelick attempted to make a leaping grab, but the ball bounced off the top of the wall before he caught it and the Brewers ended up forcing runners out at home plate and third base.

Muncy was asked after Game 2 whether he feared Frelick would make the catch when he saw the ball heading in that direction.

“I definitely thought he got it,” Muncy said. “That back wall is so close to the center-field wall. I didn’t see the ball bounce at all. When I didn’t see it bounce, I thought he came down with it again. And I was about to be very, very frustrated. But I saw him sit on the ground. That’s when I realized he didn’t have it.”

Muncy also holds the Dodgers record with 60 career postseason walks.

Slumping Brewers must improve their approach at the plate to have any hope of coming back in NLCS

MILWAUKEE — The Milwaukee Brewers are making the types of mistakes at the plate that they avoided while producing the best regular-season record in the major leagues.

No wonder they’re leaving home facing a 2-0 deficit against the Los Angeles Dodgers in the best-of-seven National League Championship Series.

“We’ve just got to play better,” Brewers designated hitter Christian Yelich said. “It’s not an ideal start to the series, by any means. Just have to continue to battle and find a way to get the offense going. I’ve got to be better. We’ve got to be better. It’s just facts.”

The Brewers ranked second in the majors in on-base percentage (.332) and third in runs (806) and batting average (.258) while posting a franchise-best 97-65 regular-season record.

But they’ve totaled just five hits through the first two games of this series and mustered only one run in each of them.

The Brewers got just two hits in a 2-1 Game 1 loss, as two-time Cy Young Award winner Blake Snell allowed one hit and no walks over eight shutout innings for Los Angeles. They managed three hits in Game 2 and fell 5-1 as Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched the first postseason complete game in eight years.

During the regular season, the Brewers had the best chase rate in the majors, meaning they swung at the lowest percentage of pitches outside the strike zone. But their inability to work counts the last two night allowed Los Angeles’ starters to go deep into the games and prevented the Brewers from getting many shots at the Dodgers’ vulnerable bullpen.

"Both those pitchers were as dominant as two pitchers have been,” Milwaukee manager Pat Murphy said. “We chased way more than we’ve chased all year. We’ve been the best in baseball at not chasing. These pitchers brought out the worst in us.”

The most notable example came when Blake Treinen struck out Brice Turang swinging at a neck-high fastball with the bases loaded to end Game 1.

But the chasing was prevalent again, allowing Yamamoto to pitch a complete game for the first time since entering the majors last season on a 12-year, $325 million contract.

Jackson Chourio homered on Yamamoto’s first pitch to continue his impressive postseason. The 21-year-old already has four career postseason homers to tie a Brewers record he now shares with Orlando Arcia and Prince Fielder.

But the Brewers accomplished little else. Their only other hits were two-out singles by Turang in the third inning and Sal Frelick in the fourth.

The lack of punch was particularly frustrating because the Brewers had knocked Yamamoto out in the first inning of a 9-1 victory over the Dodgers the one time they faced him in the regular season. Yamamoto gave up five runs — three earned — and got only two outs in that July 7 game.

This time, the Brewers had no answers for him.

“He wasn’t missing over the middle of the plate,” Turang said. “We hit some balls hard but they were standing right there. Sometimes it’s part of the game. He hit his spots.”

Milwaukee’s struggles are up and down the lineup thus far in the series.

Yelich, a three-time All-Star and the 2018 NL MVP, is 0 for 13 in his last four games. Two-time All-Star William Contreras and Andrew Vaughn each homered twice in the NL Division Series against the Chicago Cubs, but both are hitless so far in this series.

“We’ve got to take batter at-bats,” Chourio said through an interpreter. “That’s where it begins. But you have to credit those guys. But we haven’t had so much luck go our way. We have to stick with our plan and stick with process and hopefully change things around.”

The Brewers remain confident they can turn this series around. They won all six regular-season matchups with the Dodgers, all in July. The Dodgers are playing much better now than they were then, but the Brewers realize they can show much more discipline at the plate than they’ve displayed the last two nights.

“You guys might have us counted out,” Murphy said. “And I understand that — 90% of the teams that have been in this situation don’t win the series. But this team has been counted out a lot this year. And I think there’s some fight left in them.”

Blue Jays at Mariners – ALCS Game 3 prediction: Odds, expert picks, starting pitchers, trends, and stats

Maybe Toronto celebrated their Division Series over the Yankees a little too much and too long. Maybe Seattle is just a better baseball team. Regardless, the Blue Jays are in must-win territory as they prepare for Game 3 of the American League Championship series against the Seattle Mariners.

Shane Bieber is slated to take the mound for Toronto against George Kirby for Seattle.

After scoring 34 runs in their four-game series against the Yankees, the Jays' offense has practically disappeared garnering a mere four runs and eight hits in the first two games of the ALCS. Seattle, meanwhile, is raking. Led by Jorge Polanco (4-9 with 1 HR and 5 RBIs), Seattle has managed 17 hits and scored 13 runs in taking the first two games in Toronto.

Lets dive into Game 3 and find a sweat or two.

We’ve got all the info and analysis you need to know ahead of the game, including the latest info on the how to catch the first pitch, odds, recent team performance, player stats, and of course, our predictions, picks & best bets for the game from our modeling tools and staff of experts.

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Game details & how to watch Blue Jays at Mariners - ALCS Game 3

  • Date: Wednesday, October 15, 2025
  • Time: 8:08PM EST
  • Site: T-Mobile Park
  • City: Seattle, WA
  • Network/Streaming: FS1

Never miss a second of the action and stay up-to-date with all the latest team stats and player news. Check out our day-by-day MLB schedule page, along with detailed matchup pages that update live in-game with every out.

Odds for the Blue Jays at the Mariners - ALCS Game 3

The latest odds as of Wednesday courtesy of DraftKings:

  • Moneyline: Toronto Blue Jays (+109), Seattle Mariners (-132)
  • Spread: Mariners -1.5 (+167)
  • Total: 7.0 runs

Probable starting pitchers for Blue Jays at Mariners - ALCS Game 3

  • Pitching matchup for October 15, 2025: Shane Bieber vs. George Kirby
    • Blue Jays: Shane Bieber (4-2, 3.57 ERA)
      Bieber lasted just 2.2 innings against the Yankees in Game 4 of the Division Series allowing 2ER on 5H
      Bieber owns a 5.23 ERA in 4 career postseason starts
    • Mariners: George Kirby (10-8, 4.21 ERA)
      Kirby appeared in 2 of the 5 games against Detroit in the Division series going 5 innings in each game and allowing 3 ER while striking out 14

Rotoworld has you covered with all the latest MLB player news for all 30 teams. Check out the feed page right here on NBC Sports for headlines, injuries and transactions where you can filter by league, team, positions and news type!

Top betting trends & insights to know ahead of Blue Jays at Mariners

  • Anthony Santander is hitting .400 (6-15) with 2 HRs in his career against George Kirby
  • Vladimir Guerrero Jr. is 2-9 (.222) against Kirby
  • George Springer is hitting .375 (3-8) in his career against Kirby
  • Jorge Polanco is 8-29 (.276) in his career against Shane Bieber
  • Eugenio Suarez is the only Mariner to have gone yard in his career against Bieber

If you’re looking for more key trends and stats around the spread, moneyline and total for every single game on the schedule today, check out our MLB Top Trends tool on NBC Sports!

Expert picks & predictions for tonight’s ALCS Game 3 between the Blue Jays and the Mariners

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Once the model is finished running, we put its projection next to the latest betting lines for the game to arrive at a relative confidence level for each wager.

Here are the best bets our model is projecting for Wednesday’s game between the Blue Jays and the Mariners:

  • Moneyline: NBC Sports Bet is staying away from a play on the Moneyline.
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Mets signing left-handed reliever Joe Jacques

The Mets have made their first player move of the offseason, signing left-handed reliever Joe Jacques to a minor league deal that includes an invitation to big league spring training, reports Anthony DiComo of MLB.com.

Per MLB.com, the deal will be worth a prorated $800,000 if Jacques is on the major league roster.

Jacques, 30, has pitched in 25 big league games (24 relief appearances, one start across 2023 and 2024) for the Red Sox and Diamondbacks. 

He has a career 5.46 ERA and 1.65 WHIP.

In seven minor league seasons, Jacques has a 4.19 ERA and 1.40 WHIP, including a 6.02 ERA and 1.66 WHIP this past season as he split time between the Triple-A affiliates of the Dodgers and Mariners.

The Mets will be rebuilding their bullpen this offseason, with A.J. Minter (returning from lat surgery) and Brooks Raley the only 2025 bullpen members who seem like locks to be back.

Other members of the Mets' 40-man roster who could be relief options next season include Drew Smith (who should be ready to go after rehabbing from Tommy John surgery), Huascar Brazoban, Jonathan Pintaro, and Dylan Ross.

Edwin Diaz is expected to opt out of his contract and become a free agent, though it stands to reason that the Mets will make a strong push to re-sign him.

Reed Garrett, who has been a mainstay the last two seasons, is expected to miss the entire 2026 season due to Tommy John surgery.

Yankees' Max Fried, Ryan McMahon named 2025 Gold Glove Award finalist

Finalists for 2025 Rawlings Gold Glove Awards were announced on Wednesday morning, and Yankees lefty Max Fried and third baseman Ryan McMahon were on the list.

McMahon, who played 54 games with the Yankees following a midseason trade, is a finalist for the NL Award at third base, dating back to his time with the Rockies. His 6 Outs Above Average ranked in the 92nd percentile, according to Baseball Savant.

Fried is finalist for the AL pitching Gold Glove, along with two other players with New York ties -- Jacob deGrom and Luis Severino. 

Fried has long been one of the best fielding pitchers in all of baseball, as evidenced by his three NL Gold Glove Awards with the Atlanta Braves. The southpaw took home the award in three straight seasons from 2020-22.

Fried did commit a career-high four errors in 2025, but he also set career-best marks with 39 putouts, 10 defensive runs saved above average, and seven pickoffs. Fried allowed just six stolen bases all season and runners were caught stealing five times.

The Gold Glove winners will be announced on Sunday, Nov. 2, at 8:30 p.m.

Mets' David Peterson, Luis Torrens finalists for 2025 Gold Glove awards

Mets pitcher David Peterson and catcher Luis Torrens are finalists at their positions for 2025 MLB Gold Glove awards.

The finalists were announced by Rawlings on Wednesday morning.

Peterson's competitors for the award are Matthew Boyd of the Cubs and Logan Webb of the Giants.

Torrens' competitors are Carson Kelly of the Cubs and Patrick Bailey of the Giants.

Torrens was truly elite behind the plate this past season.

He was in the 100th percentile when it came to caught stealing above average, 97th percentile in pop time, and 82nd percentile in framing. The only area of his defensive game that was a tad below average was blocking. 

The last Met to win a Gold Glove was Juan Lagares, who took home the award for his performance in center field in 2014. 

Harper named as Gold Glove finalist; Turner, Stott snubbed

Harper named as Gold Glove finalist; Turner, Stott snubbed originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia

The 2025 Rawlings Gold Glove nominees were announced Wednesday, and a familiar Phillies name is back among the finalists at first base.

For the second consecutive year, Bryce Harper will be in the running for defensive hardware after a strong 2025 campaign.

Harper, 32, began playing first base in July 2023. An outfielder by trade, he was coming off Tommy John surgery and volunteered to step in after Rhys Hoskins’ season-ending injury. What started as a temporary fix quickly became a long-term move.

Harper showed flashes of brilliance at first, giving the organization confidence to make him the full-time starter in 2024. That decision not only gave the Phillies flexibility in the outfield — it also worked.

Statistically, Harper ranked in the 93rd percentile in Outs Above Average (OAA) last season, a range-based metric that quantifies how many outs a player has saved. He earned a Gold Glove nomination, but Christian Walker of the Diamondbacks took home his third straight award.

In 2025, Harper was once again well above average, ranking in the 73rd percentile in OAA. For a player who spent the first 8½ years of his career in the outfield, excelling at a new position in back-to-back seasons is no small feat.

Gold Glove finalists are determined through a combination of manager and coach voting (75%) and the SABR Defensive Index™ (25%), which draws from data tracked by Statcast, Sports Info Solutions and STATS Perform.

Based on those metrics, a few other Phillies had a case to be included.

Trea Turner, who struggled defensively in his first two seasons in Philadelphia (-9 OAA combined), was one of baseball’s best shortstops this year. He ranked fourth at the position in OAA (17) — third in the National League — and played what was easily his most consistent defense since joining the Phillies.

Bryson Stott also had a legitimate argument. Known for his reliability at second base, Stott ranked in the 94th percentile with +8 OAA, good for second at the position in the NL. Milwaukee’s Brice Turang was named a finalist despite finishing at -2 OAA, 21 percent below league average.

Ranger Suárez and Harrison Bader might’ve been in the mix as well, but Suárez’s shortened season due to injury hurt his case, while Bader’s midseason trade from Minnesota split his defensive metrics between leagues.

If Harper beats out Atlanta’s Matt Olson and Cincinnati’s Spencer Steer, he would become just the second Phillies first baseman in franchise history — and the first since Bill White in 1966 — to win the award. The most recent Phillie to take home a Gold Glove was Zack Wheeler, who earned NL pitcher honors in 2023.

The Gold Glovers will be announced Sunday, November 2 on ESPN.

Stay or Go: Should the Mets re-sign Starling Marte?

Starling Marte's arrival in Queens for the 2022 season wasn't quite a seismic moment for the Mets, but the impact on that year's team was enormous.

In 118 games that season, Marte slashed .292/.347/.468 with 16 homers, 24 doubles, five triples, and 18 stolen bases. In the outfield, while Marte's range wasn't what it once was, he provided serious value with his arm. 

For his efforts, Marte earned an All-Star nod and received down-ballot MVP support after the season.

And his absence for the last three-plus weeks of the regular season arguably had as much to do with the Mets surrendering first place to the Braves as anything else.

Before Marte was forced out of the lineup on Sept. 7 after getting hit in the hand by a 96 mph fastball from Mitch Keller the day before, the Mets were 85-51.

And while they didn't totally wilt down the stretch before eventually losing the division on a tiebreaker, the offense wasn't the same without Marte -- something that was most apparent when they suffered a three-game sweep at the hands of the Braves in the second-to-last series of the season as New York mustered just seven runs.

Marte returned for the playoffs, but he wasn't himself as the Mets went down to the Padres in three games in the Wild Card Series in front of a Citi Field crowd that spent most of the series shellshocked by how the regular season ended. Just like that, a year where the Mets had legitimate World Series hopes ended before the NLDS.

Marte hasn't come close to replicating his 2022 season over the last three years, with injuries playing a big part. But he had a bounce back of sorts in 2025 and has been a key part of the clubhouse during his tenure.

With Marte set for free agency, should the Mets bring him back?

New York Mets designated hitter Starling Marte (6) hits a solo home run against the Washington Nationals during the third inning at Nationals Park.
New York Mets designated hitter Starling Marte (6) hits a solo home run against the Washington Nationals during the third inning at Nationals Park. / Brad Mills-Imagn Images

WHY IT COULD MAKE SENSE TO LET MARTE GO

Since playing 118 games in 2022, Marte has played 86, 94, and 98 games, respectively, over the last three seasons.

A lot of that has to do with the double groin surgery Marte had after the 2023 season -- the groin issues impacted him in 2023 and lingered throughout 2024 while seriously impacting his availability and production. 

Over the last year-plus, Marte's ability to play the outfield on a regular basis also went away.

After starting 85 games in right field in 2024 (and serving as the designated hitter nine times), Marte became mainly a DH option in 2025 as he served in that capacity 77 times and started in the outfield just eight times (six in left field, two in right field).

Entering his age-37 season in 2026, it's fair to believe that Marte will be in a DH only role or in a hybrid role where he isn't relied on to play the outfield much.

If he returns to the Mets, the club would in effect be giving up any kind of defensive versatility with that roster spot. And it's hard to make an argument for doing so since Marte isn't a classic DH.

While Marte has some pop, he slugged just .410 while hitting only nine homers in 2025. That's not going to cut it.

In a world where New York's regular DH for 2026 is someone who was on the roster in 2025, the guess here is that it's Mark Vientos -- though his Mets future is also up in the air.

New York Mets designated hitter Starling Marte (6) reacts after an RBI single during the fourth inning against the Tampa Bay Rays at Citi Field
New York Mets designated hitter Starling Marte (6) reacts after an RBI single during the fourth inning against the Tampa Bay Rays at Citi Field / Vincent Carchietta - Imagn Images

WHY IT COULD MAKE SENSE TO RE-SIGN MARTE

Despite his limitations, Marte was still an above average offensive performer in 2025 -- posting an OPS+ of .111.

He was also largely healthy, with his only issue being a bone bruise in his knee that kept him out of action for two weeks in July.

It's also likely that Marte will be a relatively inexpensive, one-year option.

That's kind of where the argument ends, though.

While Marte was above average at the plate in 2025, he doesn't mash lefties, which means he isn't really a fit for the short end of a DH platoon.

Meanwhile, his advanced offensive metrics this past season -- except for his bat speed -- all graded out as below average

VERDICT

Marte has been an important Met during his four years in New York, but the writing seems to be on the wall here.

With Marte not a strong fit at DH, no longer able to provide much value in the outfield, and with the Mets looking to become a more defensive-oriented team, it's time for the two sides to part ways. 

Blake Snell credits Logan Webb for dominant pitching in playoffs with Dodgers

Blake Snell credits Logan Webb for dominant pitching in playoffs with Dodgers originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

Los Angeles Dodgers starter Blake Snell has been nearly unhittable throughout the 2025 MLB playoffs.

After another dominant outing against the Milwaukee Brewers in Game 1 of the NLCS, Snell gave credit to Logan Webb and his short but impactful tenure with the Giants.

“Going to San Francisco, that’s where I learned to pitch,” Snell said in a recent interview with TNT Sports (h/t @mimic702 on X). “I was around Logan Webb, and man, he’s going seven innings like every game. And I would just talk to him, like, ‘How are you doing it? What are you thinking of?’ And he’s like, ‘Man, I’m just in the zone. You’re just not in the zone enough. You strike too many people out. You’ve got to get in the zone more. Still get strikeouts, but get in the zone. And by doing that, you’re going to get six, seven, eight, you’ll be able to go deeper in games.’

“That year in San Fran was so big for me, just being around Logan and really learning how to pitch.”

Webb has come a long way in his path toward becoming the Giants ace, leading all of baseball in innings pitched (207.0) in 2025.

Snell allowed just one hit and struck out 10, his playoff career best, in eight shutout innings as he led Los Angeles to a 2-1 victory over Milwaukee on Monday at American Family Field. The two-time Cy Young Award winner faced the minimum on just 103 pitches.

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts stated postgame that it was tough for him to pull Snell and admitted he contemplated keeping the hot hand in to complete the job. Ultimately, the bullpen was called and nearly cost the Dodgers the game. Roberts referred to Snell’s performance as “special.”

Snell has yielded one run in just one of his 21 innings in October.

“The whole postseason, I’ve been pretty locked in, pretty consistent,” Snell told the media after Game 1.

It appears Webb’s advice worked.

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Shaikin: Dodgers starting pitchers proving to be the ultimate opposing crowd silencers

Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Tuesday, October 15, 2025 - Fans of the Milwaukee Brewers react.
Milwaukee Brewers fans watch as Dodgers pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto prepares to deliver in the first inning of Game 2 of the NLCS on Tuesday night at American Family Field. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

First things first: The fans in an outdoor stadium in Philadelphia are louder than the fans in an indoor stadium in Milwaukee. No contest.

They are respectful and truly nice here. They booed Shohei Ohtani, but half-heartedly, almost out of obligation. In Philadelphia, they booed Ohtani relentlessly, and with hostility.

Here’s the thing, though: It didn’t matter, because the Dodgers have silenced the enemy crowd wherever they go this October. The Dodgers are undefeated on the road in this postseason: 2-0 in Philadelphia, and now 2-0 in Milwaukee.

The Dodgers have deployed four silencers. In dramatic lore they are known as famine, pestilence, destruction and death. These are only aliases. Their real names are Snell, Yamamoto, Glasnow and Ohtani.

Read more:Yoshinobu Yamamoto's stellar complete game helps lift Dodgers over Brewers in Game 2

“It’s amazing,” Tyler Glasnow said. “It’s like a show every time you’re out there.”

The Dodgers won the World Series last year with home runs and bullpen games and New York Yankees foibles, but not with starting pitching. In 16 games last October, the Dodgers had more bullpen games (four) than quality starts (two), and the starters posted a 5.25 earned-run average.

In eight games this October, the Dodgers have seven quality starts, and not coincidentally they are 7-1. The starters have posted a 1.54 ERA, the lowest of any team in National League history to play at least eight postseason games.

“Our starting pitching this entire postseason has been incredible,” said Andrew Friedman, Dodgers president of baseball operations. “We knew it would be a strength, but this is beyond what we could have reasonably expected.

“There are a lot of different ways to win in the postseason, but this is certainly a better-quality-of-life way to do it.”

The elders of the sport say that momentum is the next day’s starting pitcher. In a sport in which most teams struggle to identify even one ace, the Dodgers boast four.

In the past three games — the clincher against the Phillies and the two here against the Brewers — the Dodgers have not even trailed for a full inning.

In the division series clincher, the Phillies scored one run in the top of an inning, but the Dodgers scored in the bottom of the inning.

On Monday, the Brewers never led. On Tuesday, the Brewers had a leadoff home run in the bottom of the first, but the Dodgers scored twice in the top of the second.

On Monday, as Blake Snell spun eight shutout innings, the Brewers went 0 for 1 with men in scoring position — and that at-bat was the last out of the game. On Tuesday, as Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched a complete game, the Brewers did not get a runner into scoring position.

That is momentum. That is also how you shut up an opposing crowd: limit the momentum for their team.

Dodgers pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto delivers against the Brewers in the fifth inning Tuesday.
Dodgers pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto delivers against the Brewers in the fifth inning Tuesday. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

“I do think, with what we’ve done in Philly and in coming here, it doesn’t seem like there is much momentum,” Glasnow said.

Of the four aces, Glasnow and Ohtani were not available to pitch last fall as they rehabilitated injuries, and Snell was pitching for the San Francisco Giants.

In the 2021 NLCS, the Dodgers started Walker Buehler twice and Julio Urías, Max Scherzer and openers Joe Kelly and Corey Knebel once each. Scherzer could not make his second scheduled start because of injury.

Said infielder-outfielder Kiké Hernández: “We’ve had some really good starting pitchers in the past, but at some point we’ve hit a roadblock through the postseason. To be this consistent for seven, eight games now, it’s been pretty impressive. In a way, it’s made things a little easier on the lineup.”

In the wild-card round, the Dodgers scored 18 runs in two games against the Cincinnati Reds. Since then, they have 20 runs in six games.

“We said before this postseason started, our starting pitching was going to be what carried us,” third baseman Max Muncy said. “And so far, it’s been exactly that.”

The starters started their roll in the final weeks of the regular season — their ERA is 1.49 over the past 30 games — not that Hernández much cared about that now.

Read more:Hernández: The Dodgers' latest starting-pitching flex? Make the bullpen a non-factor

“Regular season doesn’t matter,” he said. “We can win 300 games in the regular season.

“If we don’t win the World Series, it doesn’t matter.”

The Dodgers are two wins from a return trip to the World Series. If they can get those two wins within the next three games, they won’t have to return to Milwaukee, the land of the great sausage race, and of the polka dancers atop the dugout.

There may not be another game here this season. They are kind and spirited fans, even if they are not nearly as loud as the Philly Phanatics.

“That,” Glasnow said, “is the loudest place I’ve ever been.”

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

Blue Jays Remain Canada’s Team Though Expos Still on the Mind

The Toronto Blue Jays are trying to make Canada proud, but thus far, they are falling short in the American League Championship Series. They head to Seattle for the next three games of the best-of-seven series down 2-0, after the Mariners dumped them 10-3 at the Rogers Centre in Game 2 on Monday.

The Jays face long odds against the Mariners, the only one of Major League Baseball’s 30 teams to have never qualified for the World Series. The M’s have an 89% chance of erasing that dubious distinction if they can win two of the last five games.

It’s an interesting juncture for pro baseball in Canada, considering there’s a group canvassing the Montreal business community with the intent of bringing the Expos back to Quebec in the form of an expansion franchise. But this time is not yet comparable to 1992 and 1993, when the Jays won both their World Series appearances and the Expos were still thriving before leaving for Washington and becoming the Nationals in 2005.

In 1993, three future National Baseball Hall of Famers were in the Toronto lineup—Rickey Henderson, Roberto Alomar and Paul Molitor. And Joe Carter hit the walk-off homer that won the series and Game 6 at what then was called Toronto’s Skydome against the Philadelphia Phillies, inspiring the legendary “Touch ‘em all, Joe!” call from the late, great Ford C. Frick Award winner Blue Jays announcer Tom Cheek.

The previous year, another Hall of Famer, Dave Winfield, smacked the series-winning double in the top of the 11th inning of Game 6 against the Braves at old Atlanta Fulton-County Stadium.

None of the above players were developed by the Blue Jays; they were all procured by then-GM Pat Gillick, who later was also elected to the Hall of Fame. 

Are you sensing a pattern here? These players providing some of the top moments in Canadian baseball history were all short-timers in the Blue Jays organization.

It’s been 32 years since the last World Series win, and the Blue Jays have only been as far as the ALCS three times since then, including the current series. But Toronto remains the shining baseball light in Canada.

The Blue Jays are owned by Rogers Communications, which also has an 80% share of Maple Leafs Sports & Entertainment. Rogers bought 80% of the baseball team in 2000 for $112 million and acquired the other 20% four years later for a total price of $165 million. According to Sportico’most recent MLB valuations, the Blue Jays are worth $2.39 billion. Which means the valuation trajectory for Canada’s baseball team looks like, yes, a hockey stick.

With revenues of $435 million in 2024, they can afford a player payroll of $280 million for luxury tax purposes, which ranks fifth in MLB. It’s no wonder the record 0f 94-68 was their best during the regular season since 2015. The money was good enough to tie the New York Yankees for first place in the AL East. It was good enough to defeat the Yankees in a four-game AL Division Series.

They spent a good chunk of money earlier this year by signing superstar Vladimir Guerrero Jr. to a 14-year, $500 million contract extension.

With at least 89 wins four of the last five seasons, the Blue Jays are perennially competitive. But barring a spirited comeback against the Mariners, Canadians will have to be satisfied with that.

A group called Players on Base is trying to raise capital and interest to bring baseball back to Montreal. They point to the Blue Jays financial growth as an example of what could be duplicated in Quebec with its French-speaking population and international ties this time around.

“What we tell the investors is that if you get in now the valuation of the franchise is just going to go up,” Michel Frison, who’s pounding the pavement on behalf of the effort, said in a recent Zoom interview. “Part of starting this group is just to understand the business. Every week we have a new lead.”

The Expos were the first MLB team in Canada, but they had bad luck and equally poor ownership. They lost a National League Championship Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers after the strike-shortened 1981 season on a Rick Monday homer, and they were frozen in first place in 1994 when another strike wiped out the end of that season. They played in the cavernous Olympic Stadium, which seated 50,000 for baseball, and had an animated chicken flash across the video board when a pitcher tried to pick off a runner at first base.

The stadium had an umbrella roof that finally had to be locked closed for good because of mechanical problems. When then-owner Jeffrey Loria couldn’t get the government to build a new ballpark, he flipped the team for the Florida Marlins in 2002, and the Expos were run by MLB for their final three years in Montreal before moving to Washington, D.C.

In the team’s last season, when it was a fate accompli the Expos were leaving, only 748,550 attended “home” games, with 21 of them played in Puerto Rico’s Hiram Bithorn Stadium.

The Big O is undergoing a government-sponsored renovation costing $870 million Canadian dollars ($619 million) that includes a fixed roof with a glass ring to allow in natural light. It’s slated to reopen and be ready for baseball again by 2028. But Frison knows that the Olympic Stadium is only a short-term fix and says a new ballpark has to be part of the mix.

When expansion comes again in MLB, the fee will be somewhere in the neighborhood of $2 billion, per commissioner Rob Manfred. A new ballpark will be expensive, too; the estimated price of the proposed closed-roof 33,000-seat facility for the A’s in Las Vegas is, likewise, $2 billion.

Frison said he spent 30 years in the aerospace industry and doesn’t personally have that kind of money, and he’s having a hard time finding it. “People are interested, but we’re looking for the lion owner,” he said. “We’re focusing forward and need that majority guy.”

That’s a lot of baseball movement needed north of the border to make every Canadian fan proud.

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Giants ace Logan Webb, catcher Patrick Bailey named Gold Glove Award finalists

Giants ace Logan Webb, catcher Patrick Bailey named Gold Glove Award finalists originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

SAN FRANCISCO — As expected, the Giants have two Gold Glove Award finalists. But one of the names is a bit of a surprise.

Catcher Patrick Bailey is a finalist for a third time in three years in the big leagues and should pretty easily win his second straight Gold Glove, making franchise history. The other Giant, though, is pitcher Logan Webb, who made huge strides defensively after years of working on being better at holding runners. Matt Chapman, last year’s winner at third base, was not a finalist after a season impacted by a hand injury.

Bailey looks like a very strong bet to become the first Giants catcher to win multiple Gold Glove Awards and he could win the Platinum Glove, given to the best defensive player in each league. He led the Majors in Fielding Run Value and it wasn’t even close; Bailey finished at 31 and no other MLB player was higher than 22. 

Bailey also ranked as the game’s best pitch-framer, and again it wasn’t close. At 25 Catcher Framing Runs, he was miles clear of NL runner-up Gabriel Moreno, who was at six. He also was among the league leaders in Caught Stealing Percentage and CS Above Average. He nearly doubled the Defensive Runs Saved (19) as the next closest catcher and led all NL position players. 

Assuming Bailey wins his second Gold Glove, he would become the first Giant to do it in back-to-back years since Brandon Crawford in 2014-15. 

Chapman was also looking for back-to-back wins, but a couple of IL stints put him in a hole statistically. He played just 128 games and finished second among NL third basemen in Fielding Run Value, fourth in Outs Above Average and fifth among NL third basemen in Defensive Runs Saved. The frontrunner is Ke’Bryan Hayes, the 2023 NL winner who led the league in just about every advanced metric this year while suiting up for the Pirates and Reds, but Chapman was also behind Chicago’s Matt Shaw and Ryan McMahon, who was traded from the Rockies to the Yankees in July.  

Webb is the newcomer, but this is a long time coming. He has spent a long time trying to get better at controlling the running game, and he always has been strong on comebackers, a necessity as a groundball pitcher. The SABR Defensive Index makes up a percentage of the final voting and the last time their data was released to the public, Webb ranked as the leader among NL pitchers. 

There aren’t a lot of great defensive statistics for pitchers, but Webb led the NL group in Defensive Runs Saved and tied for eighth in the league in Net Bases Prevented. He committed just one error in 207 innings. Rick Reuschel (1987) is the only Giants pitcher to have won a Gold Glove.

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In this postseason, Dodgers' offense starts from the bottom

Kiké Hernández scores a run on a double by Andy Pages in the second inning of the Dodgers' 5-1 win
Kiké Hernández scores a run on a double by Andy Pages in the second inning of Game 2. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

The Dodgers haven’t so much beaten opponents this postseason as they have worn them down. A lineup that underperformed for much of the summer has been relentless, resourceful and unstoppable in the fall.

And deep. Did we mention deep? Because while the Dodgers have stars at the top of that lineup, it’s been the players at the bottom who have done the most damage.

Tuesday’s 5-1 win over the Milwaukee Brewers in Game 2 of the National League Championship Series is the most recent example of that. The Brewers managed to keep Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman in check, only to see Teoscar Hernández, Tommy Edman, Kiké Hernández and Andy Pages knock them down repeatedly, combining for seven hits, three runs and three RBIs to give the Dodgers a commanding 2-0 lead in the best-of-seven series which resumes Thursday at Dodger Stadium.

And that’s been a trend all postseason: The sixth through ninth hitters in the Dodgers lineup are slashing .302/.391/.448 with 14 RBIs and a playoff-best 35 hits in eight games. The top five hitters in the order are batting .235.

Tommy Edman celebrates after hitting a ground-rule double in the fourth inning.
Tommy Edman celebrates after hitting a ground-rule double in the fourth inning against the Brewers in Game 2 of the NLCS on Tuesday. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

“It's just that trust and belief we have in each other that if you don't get the job done, the guy behind you is going to do it,” said Kiké Hernández, whose two hits Tuesday raised his postseason average to a team-high .379. Hernández has also scored a playoff-high seven runs.

“We know that, one through nine, we have the best and deepest lineup in the league.”

And the hits have been important ones, with Teoscar Hernández tying the score with his second-inning home run and Andy Pages, banished to the bottom of the order after managing just a single in his first 27 postseason at-bats, untying it three batters later by doubling in Kiké Hernández.

“I was just looking for a pitch in the zone that I could hit well,” Pages, who drove a 1-1 change-up into the right-field corner, said in Spanish. “Obviously it was really important. It put the team ahead. But more important was that I was able to make good contact.”

Read more:Yoshinobu Yamamoto's stellar complete game helps lift Dodgers over Brewers in Game 2

Making contact and putting the ball in play has been a hallmark of the bottom half of the Dodgers’ lineup — and it’s probably a big factor in its success. Even with his struggles, Pages has struck out just six times in eight games; leadoff hitter Ohtani has fanned more that twice as often.

“Any time you can create traffic, especially in the postseason, it puts a lot of pressure on the opposing pitchers,” Max Muncy said. “And any time you can get guys on base, it just amplifies that and they’re more liable to make mistakes.”

“From the beginning,” Teoscar Hernández added, “it’s putting pressure on the other side. We still have to go there and get our job done.”

The postseason spotlight is one Kiké Hernández and Edman have thrived under before. Hernández is batting .330 in his last seven postseason series with the Dodgers, almost 100 points better than his career regular-season average. And Edman, who matched Hernández with two hits Tuesday, was named MVP of the NLCS last season after hitting .407 in the Dodgers’ victory over the Mets.

“Those guys, they were made for this moment,” Teoscar Hernández, who leads all postseason players with 10 RBIs. “Kiké, I know he's doesn't get a lot of opportunities in the regular season, but he knows what he can do.”

“He was a player who was born for this moment,” Pages added of Kiké Hernández. “He’s demonstrated that. And he keeps doing it.”

Another key to doing well in the postseason, Teoscar Hernández said, is not paying attention to it. Each game, he said, offers another chance for success or failure and in the playoffs, each game — and each at-bat — is magnified.

So it’s all about what you’ve done lately. Play the game, celebrate the victory or mourn the defeat, then flush it and get ready to do it all over again.

Read more:Hernández: The Dodgers' latest starting-pitching flex? Make the bullpen a non-factor

“I know we have big names in our lineup. We have really good players,” he said. “But at the same time, we still have to go there and get our job done. It's not because we had a good lineup that we score a lot of runs. We go there with confidence, with a plan and the just try to execute.”

If they can do that two more times at home this week, the Dodgers can end the Brewers season and give themselves a week’s rest before returning to the World Series for the second time in as many years.

“We’re good. We’re really good,” said Kiké Hernández, who is one of the reasons for that. “The experience, the trust that we have in each other, that if we're down in the game early, we're going to find a way to come back and tie it or take the lead.

“We're 2-0 in the NLCS, but the goal is to win a World Series, not to win two games on the road. And as we're still playing the Milwaukee Brewers, we're going to focus on them and take it one day at a time. We haven't really accomplished anything yet.”

But when they do, expect the accomplishment to come from the bottom up.

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

Hernández: The Dodgers' latest starting-pitching flex? Make the bullpen a non-factor

Dodgers Will Smith congradulates Yoshinobu Yamamoto on his complete game in Game 2 of the NLCS at American Family Field.
Dodgers catcher Will Smith congratulates Yoshinobu Yamamoto on his complete game victory over the Milwaukee Brewers in Game 2 of the NLCS at American Family Field. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

Technically, Roki Sasaki was available to pitch in relief for the Dodgers on Tuesday night.

Realistically, he wasn’t.

“I wouldn’t say unavailable,” manager Dave Roberts said before the game. “But it is unlikely that we will use him.”

The Dodgers had only one potential silver bullet, and it wasn’t even loaded for Game 2 of the National League Championship Series.

They still won. They still took the best-of-seven series to a place where it’s out of the Brewers’ diminutive reach.

Read more:Yoshinobu Yamamoto's stellar complete game helps lift Dodgers over Brewers in Game 2

How?

By making their bullpen a non-factor.

The possibility of one of their relievers blowing the game was eliminated by a complete game thrown by Yoshinobu Yamamoto. Another late-inning scare was avoided because of a persistent offense that tacked on insurance runs in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings.

With a 5-1 victory at American Family Field, the Dodgers extended their lead in the best-of-seven series to two games to none.

Two more wins and the Dodgers will advance to the World Series for the third time in six seasons. Their dreams of becoming baseball’s first repeat champions in 25 years are starting to take realistic shape.

Ninety-three teams have taken a two-games-to-none lead in a best-of-seven postseason series. Seventy-nine of them have advanced.

In other words, this series is over.

If the Philadelphia Phillies couldn’t overturn a 2-0 deficit against the Dodgers, the tryhards from Milwaukee certainly won’t.

With the next three games at Dodger Stadium and Tyler Glasnow, Shohei Ohtani and Blake Snell scheduled to start those games, the most pressing question about this NLCS is whether it will return to baseball’s smallest market for Game 6.

Don’t count on it.

The Brewers’ bullpen was supposed to be superior to the Dodgers’, but that advantage has been negated by the Dodgers’ superior starting pitching.

Reaching this stage of October has forced the Brewers to exhaust their relievers, so much so that by the time setup man Abner Uribe entered Game 2 in the sixth inning, he might as well have been Tanner Scott.

The Brewers’ bullpen was suddenly as rickety as the Dodgers’, and that was with Sasaki just spectating.

The uncertainty over Sasaki’s ability to take on an October workload is suddenly in question, and that should make for some nervous moments between now and the conclusion of the postseason.

Sasaki’s failure to close out Game 1 sounded alarm bells, and rightfully so. The converted starter still looked exhausted from his three-inning relief appearance against the Philadelphia Phillies in Game 4 of the NL Division Series. His fastball velocity has gradually declined over postseason, and he’s the type of pitcher who isn’t nearly as effective when he’s throwing 96 mph instead of 100 mph.

“It’s one of those things that we’re still in sort of uncharted territory with him,” Roberts said.

The Dodgers provided an elegant solution for a frightening problem: Throwback starting pitching.

A day after Snell faced the minimum number of batters over eight scoreless innings, Yamamoto registered three more outs in a three-hit performance.

The only run charged to Yamamoto came on a homer hit by the first batter he faced, Jackson Chourio.

For Yamamoto, the start represented an opportunity for redemption.

Redemption for his loss to the Phillies in the NL Division Series and redemption for his start in this ballpark three months earlier, which marked the first time in either the majors or the Japanese league that he failed to pitch out of the first inning.

Brewers manager Pat Murphy didn’t place much stock in that early-July game in which Yamamoto registered only two outs and was charged with five runs.

Read more:Just how much are the Dodgers charging for World Series tickets?

“He’s going to make the adjustment,” Murphy said. “He’s been really, really good. He’s been one of the five best pitchers in baseball.”

However, Murphy warned, “We’ve studied him, studied him, studied him.”

So when Dodgers catcher Will Smith called for a fastball on the first pitch of the game and Yamamoto delivered it, Chourio was ready to pounce. Chourio sent the ball over the right-field wall to move the Brewers in front 1-0.

The Brewers didn’t score again.

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.