A resurgent postseason outing from the Dodgers’ ace instills a sense of reassurance, as Los Angeles skipper Don Mattingly used Kershaw on three days’ rest in an elimination game for the second straight year. “But other than that it’s a very, very good game, and you’re facing a pitcher, who when he’s right, they just don’t get a lot of hits and he was right”. The team won two of three in Los Angeles in early July before splitting the first two games of this series there.
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The last time the Mets were in the playoffs, in 2006, current Yankees’ outfielder Carlos Beltran played for the Mets, and struck out looking against the St. Louis Cardinals to end that season’s NLCS.
The victor will host the wild-card Chicago Cubs in the NL Championship Series opener Saturday.
With Greinke and deGrom meeting, Kershaw says the series is “dead-even”.
“The one pitch I know he wants back is the pitch to Kershaw”, Collins said.
“We’re really confident. We’re going home for Game 5 with Zack Greinke on the mound”, utility man Kiké Hernandez said. He’s just very impressive, just very tough to square up. “I mean, he’s really a credit to the game, and so you’re really happy for him to be able to do that tonight”. The pitcher who dominated the sport with a 1.66 ERA this season, has an option to become a free agent, thanks to a clause in his six-year $147-million contract. As one of two right-handers on the Dodgers’ post-season roster, he has allowed two or fewer runs 27 times.
For the first nine seasons of Zack Greinke’s major-league career, he operated under the unending belief that the key to pitching was keeping the opposition off balance, mixing up the ordering of his pitches and capitalizing on the element of surprise. The A’s have fired first-base coach Tye Waller, according to multiple reports.
Even so, the Mets received solo homers from Yoenis Cespedes and Conforto against Greinke in Game 2 and were in position to win until Chase Utley’s controversial takeout slide on Ruben Tejada sparked the Dodgers’ 5-2 victory.
“It will be a fun one to watch”, Mets outfielder Curtis Granderson said. DeGrom, a long-haired 27-year-old with a fastball that reaches the upper 90s in m.p.h., struck out 13 over seven scoreless innings in which he allowed only five hits. That was the case in game one, remember when Kershaw exited the only run he had given up was a Daniel Murphy home run (same run he gave up last night).
The formula seems so simple: Assemble a pair of aces on your staff and then ride them through the best-of-five and best-of-seven postseason series on shorter rest where you can take advantage of the days off, allowing them to start 3 to 5 times per series. Game three was a bit of an anomaly with the two teams scoring a combined twenty runs in what was an unexpected offensive outburst.
“Anything can happen, ” Mattingly said.
The Mets started this series by beating Kershaw, and used a solid game plan to do so. But you know, he’s had regular rest, so that’s a good sign.
Kershaw settled down after a laborious 18-pitch first inning in which he went to a three-ball count on the first three batters.
What could go wrong?
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“They’ve given us two guys that stop streaks, save your bullpen, are just day-in, day-out consistent guys”.
