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<\/p>\nLOS ANGELES \u2014 How important is a good first impression? That\u2019s what Blake Snell was trying to figure out as he started his first season with the Los Angeles Dodgers, his shoulder aching and the ink not quite dry on the premium free-agent contract he\u2019d been seeking for years. A self-created urge to perform for his new team pushed him to pitch through discomfort, which he revealed only after he made two starts and went on the injured list.<\/p>\n
Instead, he had to wait four months between starts at Dodger Stadium. In his second go-around at a first impression, he looked a lot more like the guy the Dodgers doubled down on their prodigious offseason spending to get. Over five dominant, scoreless innings in a 9-1 win against the Toronto Blue Jays Saturday night, the left-hander looked like the guy who has claimed two Cy Youngs, whose electric stuff is a certifiable ceiling-raiser.<\/p>\n
Maybe he won\u2019t punctuate getting a five-year, $182 million contract with a season worthy of consideration for a third trophy as one of the best pitchers in the sport. Instead, he could very well be the most important arm in getting the Dodgers where they want to be to repeat in October.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think for me, that whole first impression narrative is over,\u201d Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said Saturday afternoon. \u201cHe needs to pitch well. \u2026 All he cares about, all I care about, is him pitching well. I don\u2019t care about the contract. I care about winning. Now it\u2019s time to just kind of win baseball games.\u201d<\/p>\n
Snell\u2019s bothersome left shoulder is healthy. That much has been clear through two starts back from the injured list. He also appears to be gearing up for the kind of second-half run he had last summer for the San Francisco Giants, when he had a 1.45 ERA in 12 starts after the All-Star break to set up his big payday. This is what the Dodgers are hoping for.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen Blake\u2019s on, he\u2019s really, really tough to hit,\u201d said Michael Conforto, who was also Snell\u2019s teammate in San Francisco. \u201cAs tough as anybody. It\u2019s pretty close to what we were seeing last year when he was really, really dominant.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dodger Stadium\u2019s subwoofers had hardly stopped reverberating to a Kendrick Lamar track by the time Snell completed a crisp, nine-pitch first inning that required just six pitches for his first two strikeouts. His fastball touched 98.4 mph to get out of the second inning. A Blue Jays lineup that entered the day striking out at the lowest clip in the sport (17.1 percent) fanned 10 times in just 21 hitters.<\/p>\n
They flailed at breaking balls in the dirt. They chased fastballs above the letters. A changeup fooled Alejandro Kirk badly enough in the second inning that it brought the stout catcher to a knee. Another in the third inning fooled Ernie Clement badly enough that the bat flew at warp speed into the Dodgers dugout.<\/p>\n
\u201cBlake was Blake Snell,\u201d catcher Dalton Rushing said. \u201cHe had everything working. He executed the offspeed and executed his fastballs to spots early in the count. Caught hitters in between, and that\u2019s kind of what he does.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Catcher Dalton Rushing said Blake Snell had \u201ceverything working\u201d in a 9-1 win over the Blue Jays. (Kiyoshi Mio \/ Imagn Images)<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t perfect. Snell lamented his fastball command, which faded as the start went along. He dealt with traffic, requiring 27 pitches and surviving a pair of base runners to get out of the third inning as he searched for mental cues to correct the issue. That ultimately cut his outing short, limiting him to 90 pitches over five innings, with room for much more.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust the fastball command,\u201d Snell said. \u201cIf it\u2019s better, then a lot changes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, it was more than good enough. The Dodgers paid Snell to whiff, getting the type of swing-and-miss they know will play in October. Snell got 18 of them on Saturday after 19 in his preceding start. The MLB all-time leader in strikeouts per nine innings put on a showcase to change whatever impression four months on the shelf could create. The only runs he\u2019s allowed in his return came on two home run balls that left George H. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa and would\u2019ve made it out of few others.<\/p>\n
This is the version of Snell everyone envisioned.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you\u2019re getting chase on balls that are out of the zone, it just speaks to his stuff looks like a strike,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cThat\u2019s one of Blake\u2019s hallmarks, getting the swing-and-miss, the chase, and then when he needs to flood the zone and beat guys, he can do that, too.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s also creating a situation in August that last year\u2019s World Series champions would\u2019ve envied when they were scrambling for starters. Their ideal rotation for October is currently healthy and largely rounding into form. Tyler Glasnow, an All-Star a year ago who threw his final pitch that season on Aug. 11, is back after a similarly long absence to Snell\u2019s and is showcasing premium stuff. Yoshinobu Yamamoto was working his way back from shoulder trouble this time last year; now, the second-year starter (and first-time All-Star) could wind up on Cy Young ballots.<\/p>\n
And add in Shohei Ohtani, whose buildup from a second major elbow surgery has gone brilliantly and who might be pitching the best of any of them right now. Emmet Sheehan is looking like a potential October weapon. There\u2019s Snell, the free-agent addition who is back and pitching well. Even Clayton Kershaw, who threw his final pitch last year on Aug. 30, is pitching his way to a 3.14 ERA right now despite a fastball that sits below 90 mph on average.<\/p>\n
\u201cHonestly, right now, watching everybody, it\u2019s a lot better than I thought we were going to be,\u201d Snell said. \u201cThis staff\u2019s stacked.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a position group that could carry the Dodgers down this stretch run, particularly as they wait around for their bullpen to get healthy.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery night you see the probables and you feel like (you) really have a chance to prevent runs,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cThen you look at the lineup and you feel we have an opportunity to score. Then you\u2019ve got to go play the game. This is how we can go on a run.\u201d<\/p>\n
If Snell continues to look like this, it\u2019ll be a more lasting impression than what he could have crafted in April.<\/p>\n
(Photo: Kevork Djansezian \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LOS ANGELES \u2014 How important is a good first impression? That\u2019s what Blake Snell was trying to figure…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":73163,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[2323,363,99],"class_list":["post-73162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-los-angeles-dodgers","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73162\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}