\u26be Yamamoto shines for Dodgers<\/a>
\ud83c\udfc0 Big East preview<\/a>
\ud83c\udfc8 Drake Maye\u2019s sophomore jump<\/a><\/p>\n
If you\u2019re reading this on SI.com, click here to subscribe<\/a> and receive SI:AM directly in your inbox each morning.<\/p>\n The Dodgers are headed back to Los Angeles with a 2\u20130 series lead over the Brewers, thanks mostly to two starting pitchers.\u00a0<\/p>\n After Blake Snell mowed through the Milwaukee lineup<\/a> in Game 1 of the National League Championship Series, Yoshinobu Yamamoto did the same<\/a> in Game 2 on Tuesday night as the Dodgers won 5\u20131.\u00a0<\/p>\n Yamamoto became the first pitcher since Justin Verlander in 2017<\/a> to throw a complete game in the postseason, allowing one run on three hits with seven strikeouts and a walk. The lone run came on a solo homer by Jackson Chourio leading off the bottom of the first. Yamamoto didn\u2019t allow a hit after the fourth inning and retired the final 14 batters of the game.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThat was the first hitter,\u201d Yamamoto said through an interpreter<\/a>, reflecting on Chourio\u2019s homer. \u201cAnd I feel regrettable, that home run, but I reset my mind and then I just focused on executing my own pitches.\u201d<\/p>\n It was Yamamoto\u2019s first complete game as a Dodger (he had thrown 14 in Japan, including eight shutouts) and the first by a Dodgers pitcher in the postseason since Jos\u00e9 Lima in 2004. No Dodgers pitcher threw a complete game in the regular season this year, which makes them the first team in MLB history to throw their first nine-inning complete game of the season in the playoffs, according to MLB.com<\/a>. (Marco Estrada threw an eight-inning complete game in a loss for the Blue Jays in 2016 after no Toronto pitcher went the distance in the regular season.)<\/p>\n The Dodgers have benefited greatly from some excellent starting pitching in this postseason. Yamamoto was chased from Game 3 of the NLDS against the Phillies after completing just four innings, but in each of the Dodgers\u2019 other seven games this season, the starter has gone at least six innings. It\u2019s the first time since the 2013 Tigers that a team has had its starters pitch at least six innings in seven of their first eight postseason games, according to MLB.com\u2019s Sarah Langs<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Combine Snell and Yamamoto\u2019s stellar outings with Yankees rookie Cam Schlittler\u2019s outstanding performance<\/a> in Game 3 against the Red Sox two weeks ago and you can see we\u2019re enjoying a mini-renaissance of starting pitching in these playoffs. The trend over the past decade or so has been that starters are getting pulled from games earlier and earlier. All the numbers say it\u2019s a smart strategy, but it\u2019s still frustrating as a fan not to have the central figures of the game play a larger role.\u00a0<\/p>\n This year has been different, though. Three pitchers have already had starts of at least eight innings, and we\u2019re only two games into the LCS round. It\u2019s the first time that has happened since 2016, when six starters went at least eight innings. Now, it would be silly to chalk that up to some kind of leaguewide change in tactics. Managers aren\u2019t suddenly eschewing analytics and leaving pitchers out there to wear out their arms. But it\u2019s still a fun indicator of how good the pitching has been this postseason.\u00a0<\/p>\n Snell, Yamamoto and Schlittler had headline-worthy outings, but there\u2019s also been a more subtle difference in pitcher usage this postseason. There have been 33 games played thus far this postseason (66 starting pitchers) and 20 pitchers have completed at least six innings<\/a>. That\u2019s 30.3% of all starts. We\u2019ve already eclipsed the number of six-inning starts from last year\u2019s playoffs (19). In 2024, 22.1% of postseason starts were at least six innings, and in \u201923 it was 28.0%. Much of this year\u2019s increase can be attributed to the Dodgers (Los Angeles pitchers have accounted for seven of the 20 starts of at least six innings) and is apparently a result of Dave Roberts trusting his accomplished starters more than his beleaguered bullpen. So don\u2019t expect to see a bunch of 1990s-style ironmen on the mound in the playoffs next year. But if you\u2019re a fan of starting pitching, this postseason has been a dream.\u00a0<\/p>\n Gregory Fisher-Imagn Images<\/p>\n \u2026 things I saw last night:\u00a0 <\/p>\n
5. A great touchdown catch<\/a> by New Mexico State\u2019s Brodie Malone-Bradford.
4. Max Muncy\u2019s 14th career postseason homer<\/a>, the most in Dodgers franchise history.
3. A sweet backhand goal<\/a> by the Canadiens\u2019 Ivan Demidov.\u00a0
2. Jackson Chourio\u2019s leadoff homer<\/a>.\u00a0
1. A 96-yard kickoff return<\/a> by Liberty\u2019s Julian Gray. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Good morning, I\u2019m Dan Gartland. Spare a thought for any New York Rangers fans in your life. After…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":214933,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82],"class_list":["post-214932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214932"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214932\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}