Latest / Who's On First? / Episode 8- Brewers Take Game 1 of NLCS and ALCS Kicks Off Tonight

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Episode 8- Brewers Take Game 1 of NLCS and ALCS Kicks Off Tonight · Who's On First?

• Joseph: Well, hello, hello. Welcome back to the Who's On First Show. My name's Joseph Lund. So happy you could be joining me. We got playoff baseball in full swing with some championship series action. The Guardians move on in a wild game five. I'm gonna walk you through yesterday's NLCS game one as the Brewers win that one. And then I wanna preview game two of the NLCS and game one of the ALCS all coming up. So let's get going. What a time to be a baseball fan with this playoffs. It has been a lot of great, fantastic, fun baseball. Maybe not these super high scoring, big run affairs, but they've still been very much very fun games to tune into. That two-to-one game yesterday in the Brewers Dodgers is where I want to start. And the Brewers coming into this one. Their goal, they needed to get two wins when you have Jacob Mizarowski on the mound. And they get the first one, take a look. Brewers win it 2-1 behind a Bryce Tarang home run and a Luis Lara single. That one was the difference. And for the Dodgers, let's start with them, the losing team. How do you look at this game? I think you start by saying you had a really good game plan going into this one. The game plan was perfect, the execution was not. Their goal was to get Mizorowski out of the game early, and he had an elevated pitch count all the way through. If you go back and watch Jacob Mizorowski games throughout the year, he relies on his fastball, and maybe against lesser competition than a team like the Dodgers, he can start out throwing above a 70% clip on his fastball. He was trying to do that, and he was missing a lot down, up. It wasn't big misses, but they were misses nonetheless. And so we got into an early high pitch count problem, only went four and a third. And that was the Dodgers' goal. They had multiple seven, eight pitch at bats. Kyle Tucker didn't get a hit, but he had a great at bat against him and worked a walk. There were so many amazing Dodger at bats in the first couple innings as they were trying to drive his pitch count up. That was the goal. They got him out of the game early. They were able to get a whole bunch of LA traffic out on the Baithes pass, but they just could not take advantage of it. And that is where the execution part comes into things. The Dodgers out. hit the Brewers going seven hits to only six for the Brewers, but they go one for six with runners in scoring position. And you're just not going to have success when you have that clip. The Dodgers on the postseason now are two for twenty two with the only two hits coming from Andy Pahez. Every single other Dodger in the lineup has been hitless with runners on scoring with runners in scoring position and that is the glaring problem. For the Dodgers, is they can't they can get the offense started, they can't get it going. They can't get it out of first gear, if that makes sense. And they can get runners on base base. They're not struggling with that. They're struggling with bringing them in. They didn't have a run scored in open play, meaning a non home run, until the fourth game of the NLDS. And then yesterday they just get the one run in the second inning off of the Andy Pachez backside RBI single. And so they Had the game plan going into it, they just could not execute. And you now start to look who's gonna be the guy to step up, go get the big hit, go get the carousel going for the Dodgers. They've been looking for that guy so far. It's been Andy Pajes. I would like to see them get some more guys on for Teoscar Hernandez. Over his last two postseasons, he had over 20 RBIs with the Dodgers. He had been their big run producer in. And driving runs in. That's what the Dodgers have looked for all the time. Yesterday he had two hits. Of all of the Dodgers in the starting nine, he had the best approach to Mizorowski by far of letting his velocity do the work. He gets two singles, one up the middle, one the other way, and he was just staying short to the ball and working the other way. That's how you attack Mizorowski, and especially when he gets into that pitching machine mentality of so many fastballs in a row. Teoscar Hernandez. Hernandez had the best approach, he would just never come up with guys on. He was hitting early and bets did not do great. And Otani only had the one bloop single later on in the game. And so for the Dodgers, you gotta get base runners on for Teoscar Hernandez because he can be that agent of change of driving in runs and getting the carousel going. And that is what the Dodgers need. home runs are great in October. We've seen it time and time again, more and more, and the more. Recent game that's so reliant on home runs, where if you out homer your opponent, you tend to win the games, but you can't be entirely reliant on it. You can't just rely on the home run, and that's what the Dodgers have been so far through now five games of the postseason, is so incredibly reliant on the home run. And Max Muncie's been hitting great. And he's just got the three solo shots. Those are great, but it's just three runs. those are all came in the NLDS. You gotta start driving the ball, getting extra base hits with guys on base. No extra base hits for the Dodgers yesterday. You're just going to struggle. plain and simple, when you can only get a single here and a single there, and great, you get seven hits. None of them really do damage other than that Andy Pot has single. And so they gotta get things going with the offense. A lot of questions to be had. Obviously, we see Otani is not at 100%. He's pulling out on a lot of balls. It was a good sign yesterday that he got the single, even if it wasn't the astronomical exit velocities velocities that we're used to seeing with Otani, but you gotta get him going. two years ago when they took on the Mets in the NLCS, Tommy Edmond was the MVP. So far we've seen really nothing from him. Will Smith has been struggling. Mookie Betts has been squaring a lot of balls up, but still somewhat struggling. Max Muncie's been a solid bat. He had the three home runs in the NLDS. And Andy Pahez has flipped the script on what conventionally has been two a rough October for him, especially last year. He's now flipping that script. They gotta get him more at bats with runners on because he has been so consistent. And so the Dodgers, you gotta trust your talent and trust your game plan, knowing that you you were going great. against Mizorowski, you just couldn't get the kill shot. You couldn't get the final blow. The big one was when Kike Hernandez came up with the bases loaded. Mizorowski was on the ropes. There was already a run in, and then he grounds into the double play. It felt like right then and there, you know, Kike Hernandez, so well known for being so amazing in October, felt like he could have broken the game open there with an extra base hit, especially a home run. All of a sudden, we're looking at a repeat of the script from last year. Year, if he goes out, Homers or puts a couple runs up on the board, Dodgers get up early, and now they have the Cy Young and Scoobyl still on the mound, who up to that point had looked really good, had looked really sharp, and it could have completely flipped the script. Instead, they get the double play, which immediately brought the Milwaukee crowd back into it, and you could feel there the momentum shifting. And then now let's get to the Brewers. What went right for them in this game? For starters, Bryce Tarang has not been great. Throughout the postseason, such a sigh of relief for him, and such a great look for this team is getting him going. He was the remember, the last ad on the world baseball classic team for the United States. He is such a valuable bat and such an amazing baseball player who just hasn't had a great October up until then, but puts an amazing swing on the ball. That is so hard to do going lefty lefty on an inside fastball, working middle away and driving. Driving that ball towards and over the left center field wall. It's really hard to do. There were only three home runs on the year of that characteristic: a lefty lefty inside, high heat fastball, driven the other way. One was yesterday, it was Bryce Tarang. The other two were Shohei Otani. So always good to be in the same hitting categories or statistics as Otani. And now Otani's really been faltering towards the back end of this season, obviously struggling with that. left leg injury, which is not helping them out. And then you heard it time and time again on the broadcast how the Brewers are playing Brewerball. And it's this small ball mentality that continues to win them games. And it's the reason they won 103 games in the season. And Dave Roberts talked about it in his press conference after the game how this team won 103 games. They are legit. We can't just come in expecting it to get another sweep like they did last year. These are two very different teams. Who have both improved in a lot of ways since last year. And especially this Brewers team. They again get home field advantage. Today they make the most of it. And also Trevor McGill, in his press conference after the game, said, Great, like now we're not going to get swept. We know we can do it. Because you know there's a lot of confidence in that dugout, but it's also hard to not look back at the sweep from last year. So the Brewers go out and get it done and prove they can do it. And so it was the bottom. Of the fifth inning that broke the tie. It started out with a Garrett Mitchell walk, then it was a sacrifice bunt, and then a single from a more defensive-minded guy in Luis Lara. He was out there mainly for his defense, but there gets the RBI single again. Easy working up the middle, gets the up the middle single. That scores Mitchell, and that made it a two-to-one game. And then from there, this unstoppable force that we're seeing that is the Milwaukee Brewers bullpen. They took it the rest of the way, throwing four and two third scoreless innings. Aaron Ashby gets a crucial two innings after DL Hall closes out the inning that Mizarowski went out. So from up to Hall, it was five innings. Then Ashby gets it to the seventh. Then it was Yuribe for an absolutely electric inning in the eighth. And then Trevor McGill finished it in the ninth. Yuribe looked really sharp, especially on that big strikeout at the end. And those were the most uncomfortable. competitive at bats of the game were against Yuribe. It was three sliders in the zone to Teoscar Hernandez. They said on the broadcast he had looked at the first two sliders in the zone and then Smolt said surely he doesn't go back in the zone and otherwise Teoscar Hernandez will put a good swing on it. He goes back with another slider and Hernandez swings right through it. And those were the least competitive at bats. Then they got it back a little bit in the ninth Inning, but by then it was too little, too late, couldn't get one across. You were able to get the tying run into scoring position. However, Trevor McGill ends up slamming the door. And this is where one of the big commentary moments of the game happened: in that ninth inning, Dave Roberts elects to pinch hit Kike Hernandez or Josue DePala in place of Kike Hernandez. And Dave Roberts has built up one of the greatest playoff resumes in managerial history. And he so many times plays all of his cards right, or 90% of his cards right. And for a long time, before 2020, and then from 21 to 23, there were questions of if Dave Roberts is the problem or his managerial decisions holding the Dodgers back. He then carries basically a bullpen and Yamamoto to the World Series in 2024, and then does the same in 2025 with the incredible managing that was on both sides of that World Series with Schneider and Roberts. But here, Alexta hit Josue DePala for Kike Hernandez. And yes, hindsight's 2020. And even though DePala put up a great at bat and drew the walk, the reason you have Kike Hernandez in this lineup is to be the October X Factor. And that's what he was in the NLDS getting the big swing against the Braves. And so often it's just this repeating storyline, this repeating constant of how good Kike Hernandez is in the postseason. Roberts takes him out. And I get that you want the righty lefty matchup. I get that that is a thing. That's what the statistics say you want. Hernandez hadn't looked great up to that point. He had grounded into the double play. But Roberts takes him out for the young rookie who it was the first time under the Andrew Friedman era the Dodgers called up somebody straight from A to the majors. That's what DePaula did at the end of the year. And so it's a young guy, and yes, he works the walk, but I think you go Hernandez there, especially when the stats don't back it up. Hernandez has reverse splits on the year. He hit 176 against lefties and hit 282 against righties. And again, he is the playoff X factor. He goes, puts up a great swing. All of a sudden, the Dodgers have a slight bullpen advantage having being that they didn't use as many arms. He puts out a good swing and you never know what happens, but DePala gets The at bat, he gets the walk, but I think that's the area of what could have been that you circle on the scorecard there with Robert selecting to pinch hit Kike Hernandez. And then just now, now want to shift into the preview for this NLCS game two. It will be Logan Henderson against Yoshinobu Yamamoto. and so for the Dodgers, want to get to their lineup. Kike Hernandez not in the starting lineup. Lineup. Dave Roberts elects to start Tommy Edmond in the nine hole. And he is a guy that has to get going for the Dodgers. Career 0 for 2 against Henderson. There's not a crazy ton of matchups. Max Muncie is the only Dodger with an extra base hit against Logan Henderson. He has a home run against Henderson. So look for him to be a quality bat in the lineup. He is hitting in the sixth hole today for the Dodgers, but then Tommy Edmonds got to get there. Things going. Kyle Tucker's been looking good. He gets the righty matchup again today. What can he do? Mookie Betts has been squaring balls up left and right. He hit two yesterday, just shy of the track, out to center to Garrett Mitchell. One was the last out of the game that for a second you thought might get going, but just didn't carry. And so the Dodgers, they're like a pressure cooker right now, is how I would describe their offense. They're creating opportunities. And you get these off-handed home runs. Every once in a while, but they're a pressure cooker waiting to explode, waiting for the big inning where they put up a crooked number, and it's will that come or will the will the Brewers be able to keep the lid closed, especially when it comes to their excellent staff and especially that bullpen and how good and reliable they have been. The Dodgers did get a lot of looks at their A relievers yesterday, which is another upside for the Dodgers, and then you have Yamamoto going today. And the Dodgers in 10 starts in the postseason with Yamamoto. They are 9-1, 6-0 on the road. And so it's not panic time yet for the Dodgers. You don't need to panic. You know you have Yamamoto. That's the guy you trust. Of the four Dodger starters between Scoobyl, Yamamoto, Glasnow, and Snell. Three of one Cy Young's, but one is on the dartboard that you trust the most, and that is Yoshinobu Yamamoto. And it's crazy that we almost expect him to go seven or eight innings. Last year in the NLCS it was game two when he threw the complete game. He gave up a leadoff home run to Jackson Churio, and after that, nothing and went the distance. that was his first of two complete games in the postseason. And so you feel good there. On the opposite side, Brewer's still feeling good with Henderson. A two four-seven ERA on the year, looked really good against the Dodgers, throughout the year, twelve innings pitched there, just the one earned run given up. And so this is gonna be another amazing pitching matchup. Yesterday we were expecting it to be two relievers going really deep into the game, but two reliever or two two starters that we expect to go really deep into the game. However, both get stifled in a way and were just grinded down. For Mizarowski it was all the foul balls and the deep counts and the high pitch at bats. And then for Scuble it was the Brewers. doing what the brewers do best, getting traffic on base, wearing him down, making him think about runners or bunters or the brewers playing smallball. And that got to him and he goes out early as well, only getting through five. And so It's gonna be another fun one. And each of these games throughout this series, a lot of people, I think this will be a game going to five through seven, a series going five to seven games. a lot of these games are gonna be coin flips, and so both teams are again feeling good. Brewers, you like getting the weight off your shoulders of getting this first game. So it's gonna be a really fun one today. That one at five PM Eastern time. as the Brewers look to go. Up two to nothing, heading back to LA. And the Dodgers look to split and then get the three to two advantage of three home games back at Dodgers Stadium and then coming back for two if necessary in Milwaukee. Gonna be a fun one. Yamamoto versus Henderson. really excited for that one. So now let's get over to the ALCS side of things. White Sox are taken down by the Guardians, and this is a brutal way to end the season for the White Sox. They go. Go up two to nothing. They get the first two wins at progressive field. And then they come back to Chicago, to the South Side. A rowdy bunch of fans that are looking to get the first home postseason series clinching win since 1906. And they lose those two games at home. Then they go on the road, and the Guardians get the magical swing from Jose Ramirez. There you go, a curveball. That was a pitcher's pitch. it was eight inches off the ground. That's one where Jose Ramirez's cap of the bat was practically scraping the dirt, and yet he's able to golf swing that one barely over the fence, and that one was the difference. Again, another amazing performance from Gavin Williams. He goes 5.2 innings pitched with 12 strikeouts, and that was the problem for Chicago. Is they could not put balls in play to save their life. 21 strikeouts in 27 outs of game five. You're gonna lose every single game you play like that. There's plain and simple. 21 strikeouts, 21 outs where there was no the guardians had to go make a play, or there was pressure. It was always the pressure on the guardian, on on the White Sox that kept mounting, and as they kept striking out. their chances became less and less likely. They were not able to put the ball in play at all. Gavin Williams looked so sharp. He closed out game four and he started game two. So the White Sox had had so many looks at him up to that point. And then he gets the game five start. And the White Sox, I mean I talked about it a lot with the Yankees when they were eliminated, how they were had a complete inability to adjust. And it was the same story for the White Sox here. They couldn't adjust. When you're When you're down and you see the strikeout numbers continuing to rally up, I think the fans were running out of K signs to put up when it was getting to 21. When you see that, you gotta go change something up. When Williams is in that much of a rhythm, you gotta go up and break that up. And this is maybe where the White Sox youth and inexperience in October baseball finally came back to bite them. Someone go up there and and call time. Lay down a bunt. Do something to throw the pitcher off of his game. Call time and talk something over. Set up something to where they just have to go make a play. Go make him feel the ball, get off his rhythm a little bit, and see what happens. The White Sox were a team that relied on chance and the intangible and being the bottom seed in the AL and letting crazy things happen. And they gave no room for that. In this one with those 21 strikeouts, they get 75 strikeouts through five games. And you just take out the ability for baseball to happen and baseball to play out. that ultimately was the demise of the White Sox. It will be interesting to see what they do this offseason. Next year is Murakami's free agent year. So will he sign an extension over the off-season? It's gonna be a really interesting offseason. with the lockout looming and how contracts are negotiated and what free agents sign. so we'll get to all that in the offseason, but for now we still got playoff baseball. And now I want to go to this series Guardians versus the Rays, and this is gonna be a fun one. for the Rays, they got Drew Rasmussen on the bump in game one. Remember the last time we saw him, it was a near-no-hitter against the Yankees. He went eight innings. and absolutely dominated that Yankees lineup. And now he gets the Guardians here in game one at Tropicana Field. This will be the first time ALCS games are played at the Trop since 2008, when I was one years old. and they took on the Red Sox. Cause you remember in 2020, when they were in the ALCS, that was the COVID year, and their ALCS games were in. They were either in Petco or Tampa Bay or in Texas. I don't remember. I know the NLCS was in Texas. and yeah, those were the NLCS games. It was against Houston at Petco Park, the neutral site there. Obviously in front of no fans. It's gonna be really exciting for the city and St. Petersburg, with all they went through with the big storms and the roof being ripped off. to now once again the fans are looking to blow blow the roof off for a completely different reason. That being ALCS ball back at the drop. this is gonna be a fun one for the guardians. They're going to be going with a bullpen game early on, and then they're gonna have Mesek and Williams to follow. At some point, they want to get them rest. And so this is gonna be another really fun series starting out tonight. You wonder if you're the guardians, is there a game in the first two where you just kind of punt? And now in the seven-game series. We tend to see that more because not every game is as do or die as a best three of five. And so do the Guardians get down at a certain point and just punt on the game and use some of the pitchers they haven't yet. And you go in and you just try to split. That needs to be the goal for the Guardians. You're playing down after having played a five game series against the number one team in the AL who's coming off a absolutely dominant sweep of the New York Yankees. And so this is gonna be another really interesting series of how do the guardians play things out and how Steven Vote and Kevin Cash are gonna manage these two teams is gonna be really interesting. I like the Rays to win this one. I had this matchup in my bracket. I like how they have Rasmussen to Peralta set up. They are so well rested. And for the Guardians in this five in if this game if this series goes to seven or whatever, say. You just played a five-game series where your pitchers got 75 strikeouts. And yes, the pitching for Cleveland was fantastic, but that was more on the White Sox hitters than anything. And the Rays team is the complete opposite of that White Sox team of they're gonna put a lot of balls in play and they're going to make you make plays. And they are maybe not gonna get it done with all the amazing star power, but they're still gonna have Common Arrow going. And Yandi Diaz and so many guys who have so many reps of October baseball and just try and wear you down over and over and over until eventually they get the big swing, they get a couple big runs, they get the home run from the intangible, like it was Mesa in game three of that series in the ALDS. And so for the Guardians, your keys to this series, you gotta split in Tampa Bay or get two. I mean, that would be amazing, but you gotta split in Tampa Bay and then get things back to Cleveland with Mesek and Williams. You like your chances in both of those games. And when Parker Mesick and Gavin Williams starts, you have to win those games. Those are must-win games if you are the Cleveland Guardians with your two guys that you've trusted all year. Gavin Williams is putting together an absolutely amazing postseason. That is gonna be their key. And then for the Rays. Is going to be make the guardians beat you. And the other eight in that lineup, Kevin Cash, his job is to not let Jose Ramirez be the one that beats them. And they're going to, whenever they can, intentionally walk him. There's not as much depth in this lineup to where he doesn't have as much protection to where he can be walked with. It'll most likely be Joe Adele following Jose Ramirez. And so Kevin Cash is not gonna let Ramirez beat them. You'd like to go get the first two at home when Cleveland is already on their heels after playing five and just go dominate. Go put balls in play, make the guardians make plays, limit the strikeouts. That's gonna be their keys to success. This is gonna be another fun one. I had Dodgers Brewers in my bracket, I picked the Dodgers. I had White, I had Guardians versus the Rays in my bracket, I picked the Rays. I'm sticking with those picks. It's going to be two very fun games coming up tonight. It'll be the NLCS at 5 p.m. Eastern. Sorry, I had to get this episode out a little bit later in the day. Couldn't get any recording space in the morning. and then it'll be the ALCS Game One at 8 p.m. Eastern. Two fun games. I'll be back at some point during the week to talk some more championship series baseball. But that's all I got for now. I'm Joseph Lund. Thanks so much for tuning in to the Who's On First Show. Saying so long, we're gonna have some great baseball today.