Game 1 of the NLDS between the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Mets will take place at 9:30PM ET when Jacob DeGrom opposes Clayton Kershaw in the pitching matchup. The Mets wont go down quietly in the series but the Dodgers still have the edge. While Los Angeles was an exceptional home team, most great teams are. New York had not been back to the playoffs since….
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“It is nice to know that we’ve saved those guys, we’ve rested those guys, and they’re ready to go”, Collins said.
If you had told someone in 1988 after watching Kirk Gibson hit his one-armed, one-legged home run that there would be a black president before the Dodgers made another World Series, they would have said that was improbable. One of the game’s finest pitchers, Kershaw has won 114 games and lost only 56, with a career ERA of 2.43 in the regular season.
For game two, New York will turn to young behemoth Noah Syndergaard. The Mets designed their rotation so Harvey, whose workload has been the source of much debate, would pitch only once in the series.
Steven Matz, who has recovered from back spasms, is on the NL Division Series roster, but it has not been determined yet if he will start Game 4 if there should be one.
While the Dodgers have been a perennial postseason team as of late, the Mets return to the postseason for the first time since 2006, when they last played the Dodgers, sweeping them in the NLDS.
In the WHIP department – walks plus hits per inning pitched – the Mets and Dodgers were again separated by very little. Both also have one dependable setup man: J.P. Howell (1.43 ERA in 65 appearances) for the Dodgers and Tyler Clippard (3.06 ERA in 32 outings after being acquired from Oakland) for the Mets.
Nevertheless, Harvey is a peerless asset.
Cespedes had a career year at the right time, with his free agency about to hit this winter.
Los Angeles Dodgers starting pitcher Clayton Kershaw watches during… First pitch temperatures are expected in the low-nineties with a slight breeze blowing out to center field. They are on the road, just as the Cubs were, and they are facing the ace of the Dodgers’ staff. Kershaw threw a league-leading 232.2 innings and struck out 301 batters.
Dodgers starting pitcher Zach Greinke didn’t allow a run for 45 2/3 straight innings this season.
It’s an imposing 1-2 pitching punch that manager Terry Collins referred to last month as “those two animals”.
The teams with the first- and third-best records in the game square off here and though it’s not Yankees-Red Sox, this is an intense rivalry. Several other players, including pitcher Carlos Torres and speedy outfielder Eric Young Jr., will continue to work out at the Mets’ complex in Florida. Or, more accurately, this brings the outcome of the series down to each team’s remaining roster; namely, the everyday players.
Neither team has a lights-out pen.
Carried by pitching for most of the season, a late offensive surge fueled by Yoenis Cespedes propelled the Mets to new heights down the stretch.
San Diego connections: The first three of 1B Adrian Gonzalez’s All-Star invites were in a Padres uniform, while Dodgers C Yasmani Grandal emerged as an All-Star after the Padres included him in the Matt Kemp deal in December. After the break, zero Dodgers hitters reached that threshold.
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For the Mets, the story was reversed in two respects. “He’s more into the spirit of pitches and his game plan”. The site lists the Mets as 17th in baseball with a plus-2.3 in Defensive Runs Above Average (a measure that combines fielding runs plus positional adjustment), while the Dodgers are just in front of them at 15th with a 5.0 score. In the second half, that number jumped to 13 hitters.
