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What a weekend. The Guardians grand-slammed past the Tigers, and the Dodgers throttled the Padres (then dominated Game 1 of the NLCS). I’m Levi Weaver, here with Ken Rosenthal. Welcome to The Windup!
NLCS Game 1: Dodgers pitching comes through
Dodgers 9, Mets 0: We got our Dodgers/”East Coast Dodgers” matchup, and Game 1 was a definitive blow for the originals. The Mets experienced something last night that they hadn’t seen yet this postseason: a blowout loss — and a sloppy one, at that. Kodai Senga was the first victim of the Dodgers offense, allowing three runs in just 1 1/3 innings to start the game, but the Dodgers also tacked on three-run innings in the fourth and eighth to continue to pad their lead.
After an entire season of “Yeah, the Dodgers are good, but didn’t we all expect a little more?” … this looks a lot like “more.”
The most surprising angle? The pitching. A staff that has been ransacked by injuries — it was announced yesterday that Gavin Stone will miss the 2025 season — has suddenly come up huge over the last three games, including Jack Flaherty’s seven shutout innings last night.
Let’s go back to just after Game 3 of the NLDS. The Padres were one win away from ousting the Dodgers, and had Dylan Cease and Yu Darvish lined up to start the last two games. Los Angeles had — well, let me eat my own words from just before Game 4: “The Dodgers are going with a bullpen game. Yikes.”
Dodgers pitchers haven’t allowed a run since. Including the final six frames from that NLDS Game 3 loss, they now have a scoreless streak of 33 innings and counting.
That ties an MLB postseason record, and Los Angeles has been involved in both — the record was originally set back in 1966 when the Baltimore Orioles blanked the Dodgers in the final three games of a sweep.
Game 2 is tonight. The Mets will send Sean Manaea out to try to even things up, while the Dodgers will go with another bullpen game to extend the shutout streak. What’s the opposite of “Yikes”? (4:08 p.m. ET, Fox/FS1. Steam the MLB playoffs on Fubo.)
Ken’s Notebook: How will the Mets handle Ohtani?
Andy McCullough wrote about it entering the NLCS. I talked about it in my pregame hit for the Fox broadcast. How exactly are the Mets going to stop Shohei Ohtani?
Their left-handed starters, Sean Manaea in Game 2 and likely Jose Quintana in Game 4, stand a chance. But the Mets’ bullpen lacks a lefty reliever as dominant as the Padres’ Tanner Scott, who struck out Ohtani in all four of their meetings during the Division Series.
Lefty David Peterson, a starter turned reliever, is the Mets’ designated Ohtani Whisperer. In their first meeting of the NLCS last night, Peterson hung a 1-0 curveball, and Ohtani ripped a 116.5 mph double.
The Mets pulled Peterson after 40 pitches, and manager Carlos Mendoza said he could return for Game 3. Danny Young, the Mets’ only other left-handed reliever, pitched 1 1/3 scoreless innings, and Ohtani hit a 103.1 mph shot off him that died at the center-field wall. Young’s fastball averaged 92 mph. He almost certainly is not the antidote to Ohtani, either.
Some of the Mets’ right-handed relievers inevitably will be summoned to face Ohtani, and here are their numbers against left-handed hitters this postseason:
Ohtani finished 2-for-4 with a walk in Game 1; his other hit was a 102.4 mph single to right off Mets righty Kodai Senga. He entered the game 2-for-15 with eight strikeouts after Game 1 of the Division Series, in part because Padres righty Yu Darvish retired him six times in six plate appearances.
The Mets don’t have Darvish. They don’t have Scott. And Manaea actually has reverse splits in his combined regular season/postseason numbers, faring better against righties than lefties.
Ohtani isn’t the Mets’ only problem in this series, but he’s a big one. And in Game 1, the Mets had no answers.
ALCS Preview: Guardians-Yankees starts tonight
The NLDS had one more moment of majestic drama Saturday, as Lane Thomas’ fifth-inning grand slam off Tarik Skubal propelled the Guardians to a 7-3 win to eliminate the Tigers and advance to the ALCS. That means we’ll get the two teams with the best regular-season records — the Guardians and the Yankees — squaring off tonight (Alex Cobb vs. Carlos Rodón, 7:38 p.m. ET, TBS).
Every seven-game series has a lot of storylines, but if you’re looking for an overview, you could do worse than the matchup between the Yankees lineup and Guardians bullpen.
Tim Britton’s best World Series comp for Cleveland has been the 1990 Reds, and the reasons can be summed up in two words: “Nasty Boys.” There was a reason it was such a big deal when Emmanuel Clase gave up a big home run last week. He just doesn’t do that. His six-out save in the clincher was further evidence that it was an aberration. He’s a bad man.
Meanwhile, the Yankees have benefitted from a revitalized Giancarlo Stanton, and the hope is that Aaron Judge will be, you know, Aaron Judge. And Juan Soto? Well, he is far too good to be the third hitter mentioned in this paragraph. New York is hoping that its “high-tech pitching robot” is the key to solving Cleveland’s bullpen.
Of course, the Yankees’ pitching strategy is of some interest, too.
More ALCS: Here’s our series preview with everything you’ll need to know, from pitching matchups to start times and everything in between. And here are our staff picks for who will go to the World Series.
Reality Check: So who’s the real underdog?
I’ve seen two competing narratives around the Mets/Dodgers matchup. The first is: “The mighty, mighty Dodgers against the upstart Mets.” The other, a direct response, is, “Uhh, the Mets have a bigger payroll this year.”
Let’s dig into the numbers and see which argument has more merit.
Surface-level numbers: Yes, the Mets have a larger payroll this year:
- Mets: $317,778,899
- Dodgers: $241,010,117
Okay, but … Led by Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander, the Mets are paying $86,710,635 in “retained salaries,” defined as: “Leftover salaries from players who have been traded or released, or buyouts for declined options.” The Dodgers are paying $27,706,461. New totals after we subtract those:
- Mets: $231,068,264
- Dodgers: $213,303,656
Deferred money: Nobody thinks Shohei Ohtani is a $2 million player, but that’s how much he’s counting toward the Dodgers’ payroll this year, since the other $68 million is deferred. Ohtani’s money isn’t paid with interest, so $70 million in 2035 only counts for $46,081,476 in 2024 luxury tax dollars.
Using those figures, the Dodgers have an additional $98,816,763 to account for, while the Mets have an additional $32,495,757. New totals after we add those:
- Mets: $263,564,021
- Dodgers: $312,120,419
Conclusion: The Mets’ payroll is roughly $76.8 million more than the Dodgers’. The Dodgers’ “deeper dive” payroll is roughly $48.6 million more than the Mets’. So no, you can’t completely flip it and make the Mets the financial bully here.
But New York is hardly operating on the cheap. You can’t afford to pay more in dead money than the Pirates’ entire payroll ($85,400,989) if you’re just a scrappy little engine that could. Vibes are one thing, but from a payroll standpoint, we’re watching two powerhouses in the NLCS.
Handshakes and High Fives
(Top photo: Keith Birmingham/MediaNews Group/Pasadena Star-News via Getty Images)
