As the Mets move on to the NLCS for the first time since 2015, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world today:
1. ALDS Game 4:
The Royals and Guardians are facing elimination today as both sides of the ALDS move on to Game 4. In Kansas City, the club’s hopes rest on flipping the script in a Game 1 rematch: Michael Wacha (3.35 ERA) takes the mound for the Royals, and the Yankees will counter with Gerrit Cole (3.41 ERA in 17 starts). Game 1 eventually turned out in the Yankees’ favor, as Wacha surrendered three runs over four innings and struck out three while Cole surrendered the same number of runs over five innings and struck out four.
Meanwhile, the Guardians will send right-hander Tanner Bibee (3.47 ERA) to the mound opposite Detroit’s pitching staff, which has operated with all hands on deck in games where likely AL Cy Young award winner Tarik Skubal isn’t on the mound. With his team’s season on the line, Bibee will hope to put up a similar or better performance to his outing in Game 1, where he struck out six Tigers in 4 2/3 scoreless frames before passing the torch to the club’s dominant bullpen in an eventual 7-0 shutout victory.
2. Brewers end-of-season presser:
As teams that made the postseason but have since been eliminated lick their wounds and look ahead to the coming offseason, part of the process is often a end-of-season press conference held by the club. The Brewers have scheduled their end-of-season press conference for 11am local time (h/t Curt Hogg of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel). The biggest question facing the Brewers this winter is how they’ll replace star shortstop Willy Adames, who is scheduled to hit free agency next month and figures to be out of the small-market club’s price range. Aside from Adames, the club will also see both Joe Ross and Frankie Montas head into free agency and could face questions regarding the future of closer Devin Williams has he enters his final season of team control. General manager Matt Arnold will tackle all that and more as he meets with the media this morning.
3. Dodgers facing questions ahead of Game 5:
Though the Phillies were sent home by the Mets in Game 4 of the NLDS last night, the Division Series still continues in California after the Dodgers forced a Game 5 against the Padres last night. The clubs are off today as they head back to Dodger Stadium, and the workout day figures to hold plenty of questions for L.A. as they figure out how best to line up their pitching staff and who is available from their positional corps ahead of a winner-take-all finale against their division rival.
As noted by Chelsea Janes of The Washington Post, Roberts told reporters last night that not only has he not decided between Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Jack Flaherty for who will start opposite Yu Darvish in Game 5, but that he’s even considering using neither and opting for another bullpen game after L.A. relievers shut out the Padres in Game 4 last night. Meanwhile, the health status of both first baseman Freddie Freeman and shortstop Miguel Rojas remains up in the air. Freeman was a late scratch from yesterday’s lineup due to the sprained ankle that has plagued him throughout the series, while Rojas is known to have aggravated an adductor injury that has bothered him in recent weeks.
Phillies problem was they had one too many ex-Angels. They’re bad luck you know. You knew Estevez was gonna blow it at some point
LOL…this is the playoffs — where LAA couldn’t be further from relevance. Now they’re getting blamed for PHI’s bp problems that have been there for years??
Estevez has been shaky since the Phillies got him.
Yesterday was no surprise.
Rob Thomson’s first game as Phillies manager was against the Angels. Maybe that was a sign?
The Phillies problems started post season last season when Dumbrowski never addressed the unbalanced lineup and no legitimate closer. Ridiculous to spend 250 million and get cheap on your outfield needs and bullpen closer. Platoon and closer by committee gets you sent home.
How can a top 5 offense be unbalanced?
Top 5 damage done against under 500 teams and before the all-star break. Open your eyes and tighten your lips. Teams, as evidence look at the mets in this series, pummeled the Phillies with southpaws. You are dismissed.
You forgot to say “Listen to me now and believe me later.” 😉
They had the leagues 6th best offense post all star break and 2nd best offense against LHP. I’m not sure what point you are trying to make.
I forgot to tell you DISMISSED.
250 million dollar payroll that got obliterated against quality pitching. That got mutilated against southpaws. Never replaced Hoskins power. Their second half and take a look at Nola,Suarez, walker was absolutely brutal. Should have won the division by 20 games. Go away with your rankings.
When you have as many 20M+ plus contracts, how many more players can you get without emptying out the farm completely? I agree, they needed a closer, but they’d have to pay out the nose for Mason Miller. Maybe Tanner Scott?? I love what the Padres did at the deadline. Bolstered the hell out of the bullpen. I think you’re going to see teams do that more often, though it may not always work just by spending money. Just building a superhuman bullpen to win playoff series.
No Tropicana field news??? I haven’t seen a stadium failure like that since the metrodome snow incident
The saints dome in Katrina was pretty nasty as well.
Seems like a can opener was taken to it. Pics look awful.
Just saw the pics and it looks like an improvement tbh.
Flocher, it’s a sunroof! Porsche makes me pay extra for those.
Reminds of the old 90s X-Men cartoon where Wolverine is mad at Cyclops, so he cuts off the roof of Cyclops’ car with his metal claws and tells Jean Grey to tell him that he made his car into a convertible lol.
Deeds is the only writer awake and he is as worthless as teats on a boar.
You seem to have a keen awareness of sus mammary glands.
There was the 1994 Kingdome where parts of the ceiling were falling on to the field which forced the Mariners to play the last 20 games before the strike on the road. That is a true “stadium failure” as those other incidents were acts of nature
The Rays just decided to convert the stadium to open air. 😉
Great game by the dodgers
It was over when Bieber’s TJ was announced in April. Thank you for a fun season, Guards
because things went downhill after that?
@JRamHOF
No worries, the Guardians are dumping the Tigers. The BP days can only last so long until the guys can’t pitch themselves out of a bag.
@Old York – let’s hope so!
Old York: It amazes me that teams who are in the PO don’t have enough pitchers for a short series. Skubal, then a possible (hopefully not) three bullpen games? Hope it works for the Tigers.
Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? No! And it’s not over now! – John Blutarsky
? Where did you go to school? Hopefully that was sarcasm about Germans bombing Pearl Harbor
@Joe went to the prestigious Faber College.
Proud Delta Faber alumn.
Sheesh, it’s an Animal House reference.
Wiley – Is this sarcasm?? Because I can’t believe you do get the reference. Apparently, you didn’t watch movies under your rock.
Joe…. Who says Yankee and redsox fans can’t get along… years ago my daughter in 3 grade asked me what kind of grades did I get in school… To my proud answer….. CCDDF!!!
Congratulations, olmtiant. You’re at the top of the Delta pledge class.
Senator John Blutarsky!
and wife, the former Mandy Pepperidge.
Playing Rojas would be insane. They are much better without him right now
True, just don’t put Taylor in the game he struck out 4 times and couldn’t get a bunt down. Let pages play centerfield.
If I were Roberts, and assuming it’s his decision to make, I’d go with another bullpen game. The Padres haven’t figured out any of those 8 guys yet, but have done very well against the SPs. Playing the matchups with relievers seems to be working.
@Brew’88
That’s what the Tigers are doing. Keep ’em guessing.
As of 1:40 p.m. EDT, the Tigers still haven’t named a starter for today’s 6 p.m. game. That’s keep ’em guessing on steroids.
@SonnySteele
They don’t need to until they hand the lineup card to the umpire. If I’m the coach, I’m not letting anyone but the guy starting know.
I think it’s gonna be a hybrid with Yoshi taking maybe 3 innings at some point and the BP deployed similarly to game 4.
Big issue is whether they really believe he’s tipping his pitches or if that was just a red herring. If they think he’s tipping, he can’t go in an elimination game, and Flaherty will take the 3 innings. But yeah, they can’t do exactly the same thing unless they have another big lead as they were out of high-leverage guys after 8.
It’s a blue herring. 🙂
They can do the same thing. All the relievers will be on a day of rest and ready to go.
Brew’88
Hitting is rhythm. Few pitchers can pitch well the 3rd time through a line-up anymore.
I saw this in the ’97 WS. Manager Jim Leyland used the Marlins bullpen against an Indians team that was the best hitting team I’ve ever seen. He used unknown relievers later in games, and made sure that none of them faced a hitter more than once….in the entire series. Shut that teams hitters down.
Guardians did this in games all year using bullpenners for 5-6 innings when they had a lead. It resulted in an outrageous percentage of wins. The Tigers did the same thing starting maybe
3 weeks ago. Now the Dodgers.
For years I’ve seen AAA pitchers be called up to start MLB games. Almost all can do decently the first time through the order, some-
times the 2nd.
Pro sports are copy cat. This will not end during these playoffs, It will carry onto next year. Bullpenners are cheap. Who cares if they throw out their arms. There’s always more coming up. This is a key to how the Rays have won for years on low budgets.
True but the more the Padres see the relievers in theory the less difficult it will be to hit them. The other risk is that by bringing in 8-9 relievers at least a couple of them will be wild or not have best stuff. I get the sense that the Dodgers will go bullpen with option of Yamamoto/Flaherty if necessary.
Let’s hope Cole closes this out tonight. I do not want Rodon pitching a decisive Game 5.
With Cole on regular rest, I expect he’ll be a lot better.
I just wish Judge could figure out Wacha.
He just needs to figure it out at this point. I saw two pitches last night that he normally crushes yet was fouled off. The game shouldn’t have been that close and you can’t rely on the bullpen to be perfect.
Just do a BP game both starting staffs are gassed or bad
@SweetBabyRayKingsThickThighs
What happened to the great SPs that went 7 or 8 innings in the playoffs and kept the game at 1 or 2 runs? What a joke the SP has become. Going a few innings. I miss the good ol’days!
Corbin Burnes did exactly that like a week ago and it didn’t help the Orioles advance past the first round, so…
@King Floch
Well, the O’s bats went silent since late August. Can’t really help that, right?
Mets starters have been routinely going 6-7 innings for weeks now.
@SonnySteele
Maybe I should jump on the Mutts bandwagon?
Dodgers put up a fight. Now I’m not sure who wins between the Padres and Dodgers, it’ll be a fun game to watch!
As for the Brewers, I’m not underestimating them. Even if they lose Adames to free agency, they’re still the favorite to win the NL Central next year in my mind.
>MLBTR is now shilling for the Better Help scam
Um hello, OOF Department?
Any word on the Tampa bay rays? They now have an outdoor stadium.
They can play in Miami. The Marlins aren’t competing next year anyway, so it won’t matter if they miss some games or just forfeit.
Where are the Rays going to play next season?
They should go on tour like the Savannah Bananas.
It might actually improve their attendance numbers!
Tropicana Field. It’s Florida, they can do construction during the winter months. It’s not like it snows there.
They are now saying just the engineering assessment could take 2 months. Because of the lack of a drainage system in the stadium it could be weeks before they can start the engineering assessment.
Not sure what they would use as the material to replace the roof since area media is saying the Teflon coated fiberglass fabric is no longer up to current building codes. I am sure there are new, even tougher materials available, but how long to produce to size those materials.
I am sure that much of the 18 miles of cabling and the anchorages for that cabling will have to ne replaced too. Possibly some of the structural beams that the roof was anchored too.
The original roof took 8 months to install. Just the roof. Not the structural supports. If the new one takes only that long after the city gets all the water out and the debris removed and the engineers get to go in and do their jobs, we are looking at the stadium pssibly being ready next August or September.
So the question stands. Where will the Rays play next season?
Can you imagine if the Rays made the playoffs and they used the roof as an excuse to not have any answer in RF next season (because they bought a roof instead of a RF when they don’t have any excuse to not get both) beyond who ever showed up with a pulse and a not-pulled hamstring?
I snuck some pine tar onto Bobby Witt Jr.’s bat.
A team after season press conference that’s conspicuously absent: the White Sox. They cancelled Sox Fest the last two years so why not hide as all cowards do.
Getz is probably busy finding a new manager before holding a White Sox presser. They need a new fall guy face for next season bc it certainly won’t be Getz himself.
Just keep Grady Sizemore. No need to search with the team not competing next year.
What manager in their right mind would want to walk into such a hopeless situation? Terrible players who are never going to be better than they are now; a chintzy owner who is actually cutting payroll again; and a clueless GM who doesn’t have any idea as to how to rebuild a team. It’s an entry level job at best.
Barely. Ask Rick renteria.
As someone said, only 30 of these jobs. Someone will take it even if only as a stepping stone to a good job.
Royals fans, if you go to New York for game 5, you should eat at Le Pavillon. You can tell me why if you know your Royals history. Go on their website and scroll down.
After what A.J did yesterday catching Cleveland by surprise it;ll be interesting what line up Cleveland uses today. I feel Detroit can wheel pitchers out at will today, and Saturday if needed.
I had to put on the heat this morning, but the suns out. The weather turns to fall, and they play at night for the first time, go figure. Go Tigers I’m sure we will see it all today from both teams.
Dave Roberts should start a reliever in the first, then go to Yamamoto.
Astute and logical db.
If I had to guess, that’s what will happen
Yamamoto is much better after 30-40 pitches in a game…this is a fact. Maybe it’s feel for the ball, etc, doesn’t really matter why. I know this sounds crazy but, get him worn out in the pen a little bit and THEN bring him in during the 2nd or 3rd inning.. LA only wants 3-4 innings out of him anyway.
Tigers win tonight and Skubal starts Game 1 of the AL Championship series. Book it!
I just lost my motorcycle because of you, thanks
No one listens to me. Not even my dog 😉 Apparently I jinxed them.