Right now final yr, the stress was palpable.
Up till final October, the Dodgers had a status as postseason failures.
It wasn’t an unwarranted distinction. In every of the earlier two seasons, the crew had been upset within the Nationwide League Division Sequence by lesser opponents within the San Diego Padres and Arizona Diamondbacks. The autumn earlier than that, their title protection flamed out in opposition to the underdog Atlanta Braves within the NL Championship Sequence. Sure, they gained a World Sequence within the pandemic-shortened 2020 season. However exterior of that, it’d been greater than three many years since they final triumphed below typical circumstances.
That checkered historical past weighed on them. Their urgency to vary it in final yr’s playoffs was fervent.
“That type of bitter style that you’ve got if you make an early exit from the postseason, our guys are uninterested in it,” supervisor Dave Roberts mentioned on the eve of final yr’s postseason. “So that is one other alternative. I do sense that edge.”
This week, after all, the Dodgers face a special type of dynamic.
After their memorable run to a championship final yr, the crew has gotten the monkey of its full-season title drought off its again. And whereas expectations are nonetheless excessive, with the Dodgers and their record-setting $400-million roster set to start the playoffs with a best-of-three wild-card spherical beginning Tuesday in opposition to the Cincinnati Reds, the questions on previous October disappointments have dissipated.
So, does the stress of this postseason really feel completely different?
“You’ll assume,” veteran third baseman Max Muncy mentioned. “However the stress’s all the time going to be there. Particularly if you’re this crew, if you’re the Los Angeles Dodgers, there’s a whole lot of expectations round you. There’s a whole lot of stress.”
Certainly, after an underwhelming common season that noticed the Dodgers win the NL West for the twelfth time within the final 13 years, however fail to safe a first-round bye as one of many NL’s prime two playoff seeds, the Dodgers have a brand new activity earlier than them.
Erase the frustrations of their 93-win marketing campaign. Preserve the momentum they constructed with a 15-5 regular-season end. And recreate the desperation that carried them to the promised land final fall, as they attempt to turn into MLB’s first repeat champion in 25 years.
“For us, the problem will not be letting that stress get to you and discovering our rhythm, discovering what’s going to work for us this yr,” Muncy mentioned. “Every year the crew has to search out their identification once they get up to now. You’ve gotten an identification throughout the common season, and you need to discover a entire ‘nother identification within the postseason.”
The Dodgers’ most well-liked identification for this yr’s crew figures to be the alternative of what labored final October.
In contrast to final yr, the crew has a wholesome and star-studded beginning rotation getting into the playoffs. Additionally in contrast to final yr, the bullpen is a significant query mark regardless of an encouraging finish to the common season.
For the wild-card sequence, it means the crew will want large innings out of Recreation 1 starter Blake Snell, Recreation 2 starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto and (if needed) Recreation 3 starter Shohei Ohtani — who’s being saved for the potential winner-take-all contest partly to assist handle his two-way workload.
Ideally, their manufacturing ought to ease the burden on a aid corps that ranked twenty first within the majors in ERA throughout the common season, and has no clear-cut hierarchy for its most trusted arms.
“The beginning pitching is significantly higher” than it was final yr, Roberts mentioned Monday. “That’s in all probability the largest distinction between final yr’s crew.”
Granted, the Dodgers do really feel higher about their bullpen proper now, due to the return of Roki Sasaki, the reallocation (at the very least for this sequence) of Emmet Sheehan and Tyler Glasnow from the rotation to aid roles, and up to date enhancements from Blake Treinen and Tanner Scott.
“[We have] far more confidence than we had a pair weeks in the past,” Roberts mentioned of the bullpen. “I believe that it’s as a result of these guys have proven the arrogance in themselves, the place they’re throwing the baseball. I believe final week we noticed guys extra on the assault setting the tone, versus pitching behind or pitching too cautious.”
Dodgers reliever Tanner Scott delivers in opposition to the San Francisco Giants on Sept. 19.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Instances)
Nonetheless, it’s anybody’s guess as to who will pitch within the ninth inning, or be known as upon within the highest-leverage moments.
Shut, late contests can be finest for the Dodgers to keep away from.
To that finish, the continuation of the Dodgers’ latest uptick on the plate would additionally assist. Throughout a dismal 22-32 stretch from July 4 to Sept. 6, the Dodgers ranked twenty seventh in scoring, struggling to beat accidents to a number of key items, slumps from a few of their largest stars, and a normal lack of constant execution in situational alternatives. Over their closing 20 video games, nonetheless, the lineup averaged an NL-best 5.55 runs per recreation behind late-season surges from Ohtani and Mookie Betts, plus team-wide enhancements whereas hitting with runners in scoring place.
“The crew is beginning to hearth on all cylinders, lastly,” Muncy mentioned. “It’s one thing that we haven’t actually felt all yr.”
The Dodgers had excellent news on the damage entrance throughout Monday’s crew exercise at Dodger Stadium. Muncy, who missed the final 4 video games of the common season whereas battling leg bruises and what Roberts has described as different “general physique” points, is predicted to be within the lineup. So too is Tommy Edman, who hasn’t performed within the subject since final Wednesday due to a lingering ankle damage.
The large query stays catcher Will Smith, who has been out since Sept. 9 with a proper hand fracture.
Roberts mentioned Monday the crew has been “inspired” with Smith’s latest progress. The slugger was even in a position to take reside at-bats Monday night time.
“If he can get by means of immediately and really feel good,” Roberts mentioned, “then it’s a viable thought” that he may very well be on the ultimate 26-man roster the Dodgers must submit forward of Tuesday’s recreation for the wild-card sequence.
Both means, the Dodgers’ largest concern stays on sustaining their latest degree of play. Erasing previous October failures may now not be a motivation. However, like Muncy, Roberts mentioned the urgency to win one other World Sequence stays the identical.
“I don’t know if it’s simpler or tougher that we gained final yr,” Roberts mentioned. “However, actually, all we care about is successful this yr.”
