It's Crunch Time

Today, Tyler Glasnow has the opportunity to pitch the game of his life and send the Dodgers to the NLCS. This is why they traded Pepiot and DeLuca for the big fellow. If he can control his pitches, it will be a long day for the Phillies. If he can’t, it will be a long day for the Dodgers. I would imagine that Tanner Scott is going to have to pitch an inning, and Sheehan could go a couple. Today would be a perfect time for Glasnow to pitch the game of his life!

Yesterday would have been the perfect time for Clayton Kershaw to do that, too, but you can’t sugar-coat how bad he was. Andy Pages is hitting .053 in the playoffs. His ABs have been remarkably undisciplined. Rojas is hitting .375 in the playoffs and has zero strikeouts. I would say that it’s pretty apparent that Doc had no confidence in Pages in that situation. Rojas can’t play CF, so who else was going to? Dean is probably the best CF on the team since Edman can’t play it right now. It made perfect sense to me… it just didn’t work.

Just because something doesn’t work, doesn’t mean it doesn’t make sense. We praised Doc when Banda pitched well, but if he pitched poorly, most fans would have criticized him. It’s the player… not the manager, who executed. Managers manage, players play, and morons moan and groan, blaming the manager when things go south. 😉 Clayton was horrible on a night when Doc needed him. Pure and simple. I can’t sugarcoat that.

I hate to say it, but I would leave Kershaw and Treinen off the NLCS Roster IF the Dodgers make it there. Henriquez, Casparius, or maybe Hurt?

Here’s the long and short of it:

1. Don’t pitch Clayton or Treinen against the Phillies.
2. Freddie needs to step up. It’s time.
3. Ohtani needs to extract his head from his rear. He had 10 Ks in 23 ABs! He needs to get red hot!
4. Blake Treinen should not pitch against the Phillies, even though he pitched a scoreless inning last night. In 2021, his fastball velocity was in the 96th percentile. Now it’s in the 72nd percentile.

5. Someone needs to pitch well in the 8th inning (Thanks, Mushers Pop), and I think it has to be Tanner Scott.

It’s crunch time.