Heading into the NLCS, the Milwaukee Brewers knew they just needed to weather the Los Angeles Dodgers' starting pitchers in order to really take advantage of their bullpen, which has been a major issue all season long, even after the emergence of Roki Sasaki as a quality closer.
The problem? Knocking starters out of games has been borderline impossible for Pat Murphy's squad to accomplish, with all but one inning of the first two games of the NLCS at American Family Field being pitched by either Game 1 starter Blake Snell or Game 2's Yoshinobu Yamamoto.
Asked how he's been able to ride his starters so deep into games while barely having to break a sweat after the win, Dave Roberts kept it simple, celebrating Snell and Yamamoto for making his life as a manager easier.
“It's a combo of each one of these guys is throwing the ball incredibly well,” Roberts noted via Dodgers Nation. “There's been things with the bullpen, it goes to weighing out whoever is behind them has to be a better option.”
While Snell and Yamamoto are very different pitchers who usually get things done in relatively different ways, in the NLCS, they've both been remarkably similar at commanding their pitches, forcing opposing hitters into groundouts, swing-and-miss, and down-looking situations with an almost perfect track record.
Can the Dodgers count on this level of production forever? No, that would be foolish, but the more innings Roberts can avoid having to call upon his bullpen, the better chance the Dodgers have of getting wins on the way to the World Series, as when their starters are pitching this efficiently, the Brewers simply don't have the firepower to match them.
