Say what you want Blake Snell. You may not like his Only Use Strike Zone in Case of Emergency pitching style, but in Game 1 of the National League Championship Series, the Brewers found it even less fun to hit against. Snell sliced through a Milwaukee lineup that scored 22 runs in the NLDS like a knife through absolutely nothing, ending his night by knocking out 17 consecutive runs. He gave up the minimum over eight innings in an absolutely dominant performance as the Dodgers defeated the Brewers 2-1 to take a 1-0 lead in the NLCS.
A long bout of shoulder inflammation limited Snell to just 11 starts and 61 1/3 innings this season, but during those 11 starts he was excellent, posting a 2.35 ERA and 2.69 FIP. He had been even better in the playoffs, picking up wins against the Reds and Phillies and allowing just two runs, five hits and five walks while striking out eighteen. On Monday evening he made those performances seem like a warm-up. Snell threw eight innings for the second time in his entire career and finished with 10 strikeouts, no walks and one hit. That one hit was a weak line drive by that third baseman Caleb Durbin dumped into center field in the third inning. Durbin then broke way too early for second, allowing Snell to throw to first and easily catch him at second. “You’ve got to disrupt it,” Milwaukee manager Pat Murphy said between innings. “You have to do something. He looks very sharp.” The Brewers did nothing.
It wasn’t surprising to see Snell deal, but it was surprising to see him not walking anyone. The game plan for the Brewers was simple, but difficult to execute. They had the lowest chase rate and sixth-highest walk rate in baseball this season. They had to be patient and force Snell to throw the ball in the zone. The Dodgers wanted the same thing. “I can’t let him nibble,” the Los Angeles manager said Dave Roberts before the match. Snell didn’t nibble. He reached the zone 50% of the time, well above his regular season rate of 44%, and just a hair below the Major League average of 51%. It was only the third time in the past two seasons that he was without a base on balls. His move was particularly devastating, and he threw it 37% of the time, the second-highest percentage of his entire career. Between innings, he sat on the bench and thumbed through a one-inch, three-ring binder that contained scouting reports or notes for an AP chemistry gap year.
The Brewers, for their part, also pitched well, but repeatedly ran into problems in the middle innings. Opener Aaron Ashby and bulk reliever Quinn Priester got through the first three innings with two walks and no hits. It seemed like Priester’s ability to induce groundballs might just confuse a Dodgers team that had the highest flyball rate in baseball. Roberts disagreed. “The first couple of innings, I liked our at-bats,” he said during an in-game interview. It wasn’t necessarily clear what Roberts liked so much, other than the fact that the Dodgers had only struck out twice. To that point, they had two walks, no hits and one hard-hit ball. But he would be proven right soon enough.
Priest walked Teoscar Hernández on four pitches to start the fourth inning, and Freddie Vrijman almost made him pay for it right away, taking a deep drive to left field. Isaac Collinswho had not played any left field since September 28, made a fantastic leaping catch just before crashing into the wall. The hard contact had only just begun. Will Smith ripped a single down the middle and Tommy Edman hit a first-pitch single to center field to load the bases with one out. Max Muncy shot the hardest ball yet, a 105 mph shot into the deepest part of the ballpark, and it looked like the Dodgers would strike first.
Sal Frelickwho played just eight games in midfield all season, almost made his own fantastic catch against the wall. Instead, he did something even better.
The ball bounced out of his glove, along the padded top of the wall and then back into the glove. Frelick shot the ball back into the infield, where all the runners – unclear whether the ball was a home run or had been caught – were still camped on their bases. But it wasn’t a catch or a home run. Hernández bolted for home, sliding a split second late after a brilliant relay from the shortstop Joey Ortiz. It was a forced elimination. Strangely, none of the other runners had moved. Edman was still in second place and Smith was still in third place. Durbin, not wanting to draw the Dodgers’ attention, gently motioned Contreras to third. Contreras ran to the base and stepped on the bag. No one was sure if he had just played a doubles match. Roberts answered the phone. Frelick had taken off his hat somewhere in all the fuss, and he just stood there on the warning track, with his palms in the air and his eyes wide open, looking left, then right, then back again for someone who could tell him what exactly he had just been a part of:
As he put his hat back on, a camera caught him grinning from ear to ear and asking a teammate, “What the hell just happened?” After an evaluation, the call was confirmed on the field. It was your classic 404 foot 8-6-2 double play:
Priester had managed to get out of the jam by letting the Dodgers hit the ball harder and harder. He returned to start the fifth, a risky proposition after the way the Dodgers pounded him in the fourth. At the right time, Enrique Hernández greeted him by ripping a leadoff double into left field. Andy Pages hit a grounder to third base, and although the left-hander Jared Koenig things got hot in the bullpen, the Brewers decided to walk on purpose Shohei Ohtaniputting runners on first and second, allowing Priester to stay in and face the right-hander Mookie Betts. Murphy had said during an in-game interview that the Brewers were hoping to get 85 pitches from Priester, and that they needed that length badly enough to let the right-hander try to work his way out of trouble. Betts almost made him pay for it by hitting the ball on the screws at 90 miles per hour, but right at the second baseman Brice Takewho fielded the ball hopping and started a 4-6-3 double play. Priester had allowed four hard-hit balls in the fourth and fifth innings, and those four balls had resulted in one double and four outs. That would be the end of his evening. By the skin of his teeth, Priester had three hits and three walks over four innings, while striking out one. The game was still at zero.
The Dodgers would finally strike in the sixth, when Freeman dropped his bat head on a low fastball Chad Patrickas he delivered a towering fly ball to right field. Jackson Chourio continued to drift back slowly enough that it looked like maybe, just maybe, the Brewers would get their third chance to make a leaping catch on the wall, but he ran out of room. He stopped at the wall and the ball landed just a few feet behind him. After leaving five runners on base in the previous two innings, the Dodgers had opened the scoring with a solo home run:
The Dodgers would make a hugely useful insurance run Abner Uribe in the top of the ninth. Uribe had been absolutely tough during both the regular season and the playoffs, but he walked leadoff man Muncy, allowing Enrique Hernández to poke a weak single into right field. Pages bumped Muncy and Hernández to second and third base, and the Brewers again walked Ohtani intentionally, bringing Betts to the plate with the bases loaded and one out. With the pressure on, Uribe lost the strike zone, walked Betts and scored Muncy. The Dodgers were up 2-0, but as is often the case lately, their bullpen made things interesting.
Roki Sasakinow the official Dodgers closer, Collins issued a walk with one out. Jake Bauer pinch-hit for Ortiz and ripped a line drive double to center field. This time a rebound went the Dodgers’ way. The ball went over Pages’ head and bounced off the warning track over the fence. Had it stayed in the park, Collins would have scored easily and the match would have been tied. The Brewers had runners on second and third base with one out and the leader of the lineup at the plate. Chourio made a deep drive to center and both runners tagged; Collins scored. The Brewers were down to their last out, down 2-1, with the tying run coming on third base as a pinch-runner Brandon Lockridge. Sasaki fell behind Christian Jelich3-1, almost allowing Lockridge to send a pitch to the backstop and tie the game before fighting back to make it a full count. He lost the fight, let Yelich out and brought William Contreras to the plate.
Roberts had seen enough of Sasaki and took it with him Blake Treinen in the game. You know things are bad when you turn to Blake Treinen as the solution to wildness. Treinen walked Contreras, who somehow knocked out a 3-2 sweeper that landed just off the outside corner. It was an impressive take and it brought Turang to the plate with the bases loaded. Treinen got ahead of Turang, after which he threw a 1-2 sweeper straight to his knees. Turang couldn’t get the hang of himself fast enough to stay there and let the pitch hit him. The 2-2 pitch was a fastball in his eyes and he couldn’t keep away from it. He swung and missed, and the Dodgers had won the game and taken the series lead.
For the Brewers, it was a devastating loss for several reasons. Their offense was absolutely silenced. Because the game was so close, they had no choice but to use the cream of the crop in a losing effort. Ashby, Uribe, Koenig and Trevor Megil will certainly be available for Game 2 on Tuesday night, but they will all have at least an inning under their belts, and the Dodgers have now had a chance to see them all. The Dodgers can pitch now Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnowand Ohtani with the Brewers, while the Brewers have Freddy Peralta lined up for Game 2 and then much more mixing and matching in their future. It hurts to walk in the winning run after deliberately loading the bases. It hurts even more to come so close to stealing a win with Priest in a bulk role, only to come up short.
In the visitors’ dugout, the Dodgers seem to be coming into form at just the right time. Play-off Enrique Hernández is back at full strength and is hitting 2-for-4. Freeman and Smith each had two-hit performances of their own, and Ohtani added three walks, two of which were intentional. Despite his struggles in Game 1, Sasaki has found his role and the rest of the bullpen is fresh. The Dodgers got Ohtani back on the mound after Tommy John surgery and withstood injuries to Glasnow and Snell. All three throw like aces. The series is far from over, but with home field advantage neutralized and four top-tier starters remaining in the lineup, Los Angeles is in the driver’s seat.
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