The Dodgers have a chance to put the Braves in a tough spot Sunday night, and they’ll do it without Max Muncy in the lineup.
Los Angeles takes a 1-0 lead into NLDS Game 2 after opening the series with a 5-3 win on Saturday. That game featured a strong pitching effort from Tarik Skubal and long balls from Teoscar Hernandez, Kyle Tucker and Muncy, giving the Dodgers the early edge they wanted at home.
Manager Dave Roberts liked what he saw after Game 1, especially the way his club kept stacking quality at-bats.
"There were some good things that ... I do think that momentum is certainly in our favor," Roberts said after Saturday's game.
He added, "What Teo did today, big hit. Max hits a homer.
Kyle obviously we talked about. Just getting some guys - I thought Mookie [Betts] took some good at-bats and Freddie [Freeman] came to life.
I thought Shohei [Ohtani] looked fine today as far as process."
Now the focus shifts to left-hander Blake Snell, who gets the ball for Los Angeles in Game 2. Snell’s final stretch of the regular season was uneven physically: he left his penultimate start with groin tightness, then needed 77 pitches to get through four innings in his last outing of the year.
Still, Snell sounded confident heading into Sunday.
"Definitely excited where I'm at," Snell said. "I threw live, felt way better, can control the ball, command it. Then throughout this week, just pitches in general, release points have just gotten a lot better."
The numbers from his return are hard to ignore. After coming back from midseason elbow surgery in August, Snell made eight starts and went 4-0 with a 1.13 ERA and 50 strikeouts across 39.2 innings.
Atlanta will answer with left-hander Ray Kerr, who worked 3.1 scoreless innings Thursday against the Philadelphia Phillies in an opener role. He finished the regular season with a 1.47 ERA over 18.1 innings.
One lineup note for Los Angeles: Muncy is out, and Rojas will start at third base.
First pitch for NLDS Game 2 is set for Sunday, Oct. 4 at 5 p.m. PT/8 p.m. ET.
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It also wasnt the first time Los Angeles had to rein him in. The Dodgers had already limited Pages from challenging pitches in the second half of the regular season because of similar problems, and his early challenge in Game 1 left the team with only one challenge for the rest of the night. For a club trying to manage every edge it can in the postseason, that kind of self-inflicted drain is hard to overlook. [Read more 🡒]