Post-2025 NLWC Game 2 Thread: Dodgers Advance to NLDS @ Philadelphia

Here's what Dodger pitchers see for the strike zone in the eighth inning.

DODGERS 8, REDS 4
DODGERS WIN NLWC 2-0

The other Wild Card series today were pure chaos. Cleveland rose from the dead, scoring five in the bottom of the eighth inning, to tie their series 1-1. San Diego punched back in Chicago, with Manny Machado hitting a key two-run HR in the fifth, to tie their series 1-1. And then Jazz Chisholm's speed saved the Yankees' bacon, with New York downing Boston 4-3, to tie their series 1-1.

That left the Dodgers/Reds series, with the Dodgers up 1-0 in the series. It sure looked like the baseball gods wanted another WC series tie, when Teoscar Hernandez boffed a lazy fly ball in the first inning to put the Reds up 2-0 and drive Yoshinobu Yamamoto's pitch count up by almost double.

But the Dodgers battled back to take a 3-2 lead in the fourth, and then opened up for four runs in the sixth to make it 7-2 Los Angeles. In the seventh inning, Mookie Betts doubled in another run; Betts went 4-for-5 with 3 RBI and was the player of the game. Betts batted .667 with a 1.700 OPS in this NL Wild Card series, which is just unreal, even with the small sample size.

Meanwhile, despite being behind from the start, Yamamoto perservered and had an outstanding outing: 113 pitches, 6.2 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 0 ER, 2 BB and 9 Ks. The 113 pitches was his season high.

Leave it to the Dodgers to crumble in the eighth--again!--with Emmet Sheehan getting only one out and giving up two ER (and two walks), before Alex Vesia (who was hopeless last night) came in mid-AB and got a one-pitch striekout before striking out TJ Friedl (the tying run!) to escape a bases loaded jam.

I think I heard Rick Monday say that the Dodgers used 100 pitches to get through the two eighth innings in this NLWC series. That is just not going to cut it.

Roki Sasaki had a clean ninth inning to close out the game, which is a good sign. The Dodgers had three errors in this game: Teosscar Hernandez' error, then Kiké Hernandez and Ben Rortvedt joined the sloppy parade.

That lousy bullpen and lazy fielding ain't gonna cut it in Philadelphia. We need to regroup, fast.

And I'm not even going to talk about Andy Pages being 0-for-9 with 2 Ks this series.

Post-2025 NLWC Game 1 Thread: The Leakiest of Pens

2025 NLWC GAME 1: DODGERS 10, REDS 5

For the second straight outing, Blake Snell's seven solid innings (7.0 IP, 4 H, 2 ER, 1 BB, 9 Ks) should be the story. But it's not, because our bullpen is a disaster--and actually let the Reds back into this game because of their absolute ineptitude.

Alex Vesia entered the game in the eighth. 22 pitches, 13 strikes. He saw three batters and got one out. Both of his runners scored.

Edgardo Henriquez came into the game, and was even worse. He saw three batters and got no outs, walking in two runs.

Jack Dreyer came into the game, and barely escaped. He saw three batters, walking in a run on his own, and got a strikeout and then a pop out to first, to escape the jam.

That's three pitchers, 59 pitches, and three runs yielded--all in one inning. This bullpen is pathetic.

During that eighth inning, we had to rush Emmet Sheehan to get warm in the bullpen, given the implosion that was happening on the field. Thankfully, we had scored 10 runs by then: three RBI from two Shohei Ohtani HRs; four RBI from two Teoscar Hernandez HR; a solo shot from Tommy Edman; and an RBI from Ben Rortvedt. (An Alex Call single with a two-run error from Noelvi Marte led to the other run, but no RBI was awarded.)

So we went to the ninth inning up 10-5, with Blake Treinen in for the ninth. He got two Ks, then gave up a single to Gavin Lux, but got Miguel Andujar for the final out. Whew.

If our starters can't go eight innings, we don't stand a chance, not with this leaky pen. We should be happy with a series-opening 10-5 win. But this isn't good.

I'm not even going to dwell on Andy Pages' 0-for-5.