October 14, 2025 • 31 mins
Doug recaps a wild start to the Championship Series — the Mariners go into Toronto and shock the Blue Jays with back-to-back wins to take a 2-0 lead in the ALCS, while Blake Snell dominates Game 1 of the NLCS in a tense matchup that featured one of the craziest double plays you’ll ever see.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back everybody. I'm Doug man Kaviage and this is
the Dugout Podcast. We're basically going to break down the
alcs between the Toronto Blue Jays and the Seattle Mariners.
A couple thoughts going into this series? For me? Is
there any Game five hangover for the Mariners? Good or bad?
(00:20):
That's a tough I mean fourteen fifteen means of mental grind.
Use three starting pitchers and every member of your bullpen
for the most part. Throw that in with one day off,
travel over two thousand miles. Anybody that's been in the
postseason knows how mentally draining these playoffs. Each individual playoff
(00:42):
game is, let alone, a series clincher the way they
clinched it at home and have to travel across the
whole country to land in Toronto with only one day off.
What's Seattle going to do with their pitching? We talked
about it using three starters in Game five? Where does
it it makes it tough to find a rotation for
(01:03):
a seven game series? Also, do the Blue Jays stay
hot offensively? Do they? You know there's a couple of
days off. What's that due to their rhythm? What's that
due to you know, offensively, they were hotter than a firecracker.
I mean dominated the home series, really should have swept
the Yankees. Moving forward, you don't know what you're gonna get.
(01:25):
You know, is Bobushet gonna play big? If you knock
out ninety four RBIs out of anybody's lineup, that's gonna
be tough to replace again. Seven game series they are
way different than five game series. And also how effective
is Gosman and your Savage going to be with their
splits against the left handed hitting hitters from the Mariners? Right,
(01:45):
you're talking Polanco cal Rally, Crawford, cal Zone. How are
they going to match up against a split dominated Game one?
In game two? Move on to game one, you have
Toronto throwing Gosmen, which was no surprise. Seattle goes to
Bryce Miller. Now he's never thrown on short rest. This
(02:07):
game has a lot of implications for the seven game series.
Like I said before, the Mariners through three starting pitchers.
In Game five, you have a guy who hasn't never
thrown on short rest. You don't know how long you're
gonna get out of him. You're probably thinking the beginning,
if you can get three or four innings out of him.
Anything after that is golden. To protect the pen in
(02:29):
a seven game series, who was probably already running on fumes.
So boom you get, You get the top of the first,
You get the right guy that play and jare Palanco
first and third. I think the Mariners. The Mariners game
plan was to swing early, be aggressive. The splits late
in account are deadly. They all saw what he did
against the Yankee, so guarantee their game plan was the
(02:51):
first straight thing they see, we're attacking, get it up
and see what happens. And the right guy to play
in Polanco first and third. He gets a split, kind
of nubs it off the end of the back to the third,
get the force out at home. Osman seemed a little
shaky in the beginning, which most good starting pitchers seem
to have a trouble with the first I know you've
(03:11):
heard me say this before this podcast, everything, every time
we played a big game. As a manager, I told
our guys survived the first inning. If we can survive
the first inning and make it a game, we'll be fine.
He survives the first he goes three to zero on
the leadoff hitter, doesn't really have it finds a way
to wiggle out of it, gives up two hits, ends
up not giving up a run, so he gets out
of it, gives his boys a chance come in. Bottom
(03:33):
of the first first pitch of the game, Springer hits
it out at the right center and you're thinking, okay,
here come the Blue Jays again. They stayed hot. This
is it's gonna be. It's gonna be a long night
for the Mariners. They get a couple of guys on
after the homer, cal rally goes to the mound. Obviously
whatever he said was magical because he calmed down. He
ends up wiggling out of it, only giving up one.
(03:56):
So it's one nothing, and you saw both starters settle down,
cruising for the most part up until the sixth inning.
The sixth inning rolls around top of the six, cal
rallies up, gets behind two to zero. A split that
was borderline in could have been a ball, could have
been a strike. He calls a strike two to one,
kind of chased one down in a little bit and
(04:17):
another split. You could tell that, you know he was
definitely I don't I want to say with one hundred
percent agree that he's sitting on it. I don't know,
he'd never admit that, but it looked like he was
on it. It just was too far inside to two
does another split, catches some of the plate, and he
clicks it in the right field. Now he got a
whole new ball game. It's one to one. You got
(04:39):
Julio Rodriguez ends up walking with two outs, give up
a wild pitch, slash pass ball, and Schneider comes out
and brings in Ran a little the left hander. I
understand why right you turn Polanco around. He could probably say,
I'd like to have left Polanco left handed. I think
with to me the he was swinging it from what
(05:01):
it looked like. You turn him around, which again, over
his course of his career, he's better left handed. In
my opinion, he is right handed. But I understand why
you have Polonko, who's a switch hitter, so you turn
him around right handed with two outs, and if he
loses Polonko, he's got Naylor, a left hander on deck,
so it protects him that way too. But Polonko, once again,
(05:23):
they find a way to get him to the plate
in the right situations and he delivers, goes up. Two
to one changes everything you go back to Bryce Miller,
Who's I think he retired seventeen of eighteen at one
point and just kept going. I mean, what a magical job.
This kid did six innings, two hits, three walks, three strikeouts,
(05:43):
seventy six pitches. Dan Wilson obviously must have been ecstatic.
That was a magical job. Not only does he keep
them in Game one with a chance to win, but
he also limits the amount of times he has to
go to the pen, and add too that he pretty
much dominates a lineup that was as hot as anybody
(06:04):
in the postseason. Go forward, you end up going, You
end up getting another run. You get Polanco up again
with first and third left handed, he gets a single.
I love the postseason just for this reason. Guys. I
know hojre Plonko. I got to work with him for
a long time. The demeanor, the he always stays within himself,
and it just seems like the how they find a
way to get him to the plate in situations that
(06:26):
that that get a chance, he gets a chance to
shine without doing too much. He stays with himself, he
doesn't get it overwhelmed by the by the situation. He
just goes up there and has it gives you a
quality at bat, and he comes to again. Uh, don't
want to estimate the stolen bases by Rose Arena. To me,
he's over swinging a little bit. But you know, anybody
(06:46):
that hits ten home runs in twenty playoff games is
pretty special. You're kind of waiting for his moment. But
he's steals second, he steals third, ends up scoring the
insurance run, you call it to make it three. And
the main thing that stuck out to me in this game,
you look at the bullpens. Seattle brought in, Gay's fire
(07:07):
eight pitches, Matt Brash eight pitches, Munos the closer eight pitches.
To win a playoff game where your team only throws
one hundred pitches is almost I haven't looked it up,
but it has to be somewhat of a record, especially
in today's world where command has been thrown out the window.
(07:30):
And to throw a complete game using what four guys
and only throwing one hundred pitches shows you not only
they were pounding the strike zone, but they were pounding
the strike zone with quality pitches. To only give up
two hits to a team that was hotter than anyone,
is this could not have gone any better for the
(07:53):
Seattle Mariners. Guys only thrown eight pitches. It probably it
takes you at least twenty plus to get ready to
go in the game. They only have to throw eight
pitches in a game, really sets them up well. Now
it's just a matter of do the starters have enough
in the tank to kind of fall back in line.
But I can't say enough about Bryce Miller. He set
them up perfectly for this. That performance hopefully doesn't go
(08:16):
unnoticed whether this whether Seattle wins or loses this series.
You can't underestimate what he just did for his franchise
because that was that was nothing short of perfection for
him to go out and do that, and and to
finish that job, to get him six strong innings and
have a and save the rest of the rest of
(08:37):
the rotation and save the rest of the pitchers for
their for their team, and they're set up pretty well
moving in the game too. We move on the game
two of the ALCS between the Mariners and the Blue Jays.
You have Logan Gilbert throwing again with for the Mariners,
and you have Trey of Savage thrown for the Blue Jays.
The Savage coming off as good at outing as you
can possibly have in the postseason against the Yankees and
(08:59):
the ald S Y. Look, it's a completely different situation
pitching game two of a series that you're up one
nothing at home versus down one nothing at home in
the next series. I've always talked about this on this podcast.
Used to tell my guys as a manager, survived the
first inning, if you can survive the first inning to
make it a game, Usually guys settle down and it
becomes a baseball game again. The Mariners don't allow that.
(09:22):
A Rosarana gets hit by pitch on a three to
two count. Next batter cal rally, he walks. Now you
have Julio Rodriguez who's one two. The Savage hangs a
split and Julio deposits it in the left field. Now
you're down three to nothing right out of the shoot.
Before the game really even gets started. He ends up
finding a way to get out of that inning. So
you're up three to nothing in October after winning game
(09:44):
one on the road, huge take the crowd out of
the game. Out of the shoot. Now you're rolling, you
have momentum, and you make it so it's almost like
here we go again. The Blue Jays had to answer
in the bottom half. To their credit, they did. There's
not probably not a better guy in October you'd want
leading off in that situation than George Springer. He just
(10:07):
misses hitting a home run again for back to back games,
ends up refocusing hits a double in the gap. So
now you have a guy at second, nobody out. Nathan
Lucas hits a ground ball, does his job right, gets
him over to third. Look, I love Naylor as a player.
I think he's a really good hitter, really good fielder.
All around game is really good. He's showing the world
(10:29):
that you don't have to be blazingly fast to steal
bases at any level. He does everything pretty much right
as far as fundamentally, except for this. To me, this
is a play. It's a chopper to first. It's an
in between ball between first and second, and he kind
of gives it the quick double play feed from a
second baseman with a pitcher on the run. That's a
(10:50):
tough play. He ends up throwing it away. Now Springer scores.
Now you have the same situation with nobody out and
a man at second, and it's only three to one
look nothing lead air. On the side of caution, you
almost assume that runner at second's gonna score, so it's
three to one. Try to keep the bases clean. I'm
not saying it's not that's that was the only way
(11:12):
he could do it. I felt like he could have
got a little more, a little more safe of a
play than thrown it away. In that regard, that's a
very overlooked play. As a first basement, first basement and
the second basement, communication is huge. We work on it
at every level. We teach our second basements to call
the first basement off as soon as he can. Look.
I get it, it's October. There's fifty thousand people in
(11:33):
the stands. It's probably hard to hear. But the second
baseman can call off just like you would have a
pop up. You need to call off the first basement
on the ground ball. You call it early, the first
baseman goes back to the bag. As a first basement,
we are taught to keep the pitcher out of the
play as much as possible, and just for that reason,
they're flying over there. Usually they're late. I think we've
(11:55):
seen it recently in October. How not covering first has
led to a lot of crooked numbers and led to
some teams going home. So it's an important play in
the first inning. Kudos to the Blue Jays for answering
Kirk with a huge two out hit to make it
three to two. You know, you come out of that
after a three and Homer only down one outstanding from
(12:16):
the looks of it, to me, both starters looked like
they made pitches, but they were grinding through it a
little bit. They didn't quite have and I mean understandably.
So you know, Gilbert's got to throw how many two
innings in relief the of game five? And you know
there pitchers are creatures of habit, and if they don't
get their usual work, it's kind of switched off, and
(12:39):
you don't get the bullpens, and it does change some things.
But you know, he made pitches when he had to.
You know, you going to the bottom of the second, Lucas,
it's another clutch base hit the Tiler game at three.
Now it's zero zero, right, it's three three, Moving on,
Neither pitcher seems to be really separating themselves. You move
on to the fourth. I thought it was a great
(13:00):
move by Dan Wilson to get Gilbert out of there.
He could tell, like I said, he made pitches when
he had to, but it just didn't look like it
had a lot. There was a lot of smoothness to it.
He didn't seem easy, like every pitch was a grind.
And you know, Dan Wilson being one of the best
catchers of his generation, I think he understood that and
they made them move and it worked accordingly. On that
(13:21):
same token, we just credited Dan Wilson for pulling Gilbert
in the fourth and making a move. I feel like
Schneider pulled a starter two nights in a row too soon. Sure,
Savage gave up a home run to Julio Rodriguez, but
he hung a split and that's usually balls that get
left up over the middle of the plate in October
end up over the fence. It's not doesn't mean the
(13:43):
matchup was bad. The execution was poor, and you got
to tip your hat to the other guy who actually
hit it over the fence and gave up a homer.
Good hitters do that. So Varlin comes out, strikes out
Julio Rodriguez, and my I'm sitting there watching the game, going, okay,
that's a I feel like, that's a better matchup for Julio,
But Jorge Polanko is on deck and the Savage kind
(14:06):
of handled Polonko a little bit the first two times.
So you bring in Varlin, you know, yes, he's he
does punch out who who your right Riguez in that situation.
But to me, as as Horay is walking up in Polanco,
I'm saying this is a good matchup for hore here.
Sure enough, he does it again, hits a homer right
center field. It's it's twin on twin crime. Both of
(14:28):
them have played for the Twins before. So one thing
I've coached Polonko I've seen him over the years. Splits
and changeups are are his are his kryptonite when he's
when he's not one hundred percent locked in. He can
hit a fastball with anybody. He can hit a breaking
ball with anybody. The split and the change up, can
you kind of get that spinny kind of spirals himself
(14:49):
into the ground. It's just the way he is because
he doesn't have a lot of movement, and he doesn't
move so it's it can that third that third speed,
that third pitch tends to get him. So I felt
like that that's the ross configuration, right. We talk about
roster management, we talk about roster talking about lineup configuration.
Where he is hitting behind Julio makes a lot of
sense to me, So kudos to Polanco. Does it again,
(15:12):
three run Homer puts him up sixty three six three
m's in the fifth and you're feeling pretty good. Another
key point for me, I know what six to three
Mariner's pinch it. Mitch Garver, really good right handed hitter
has been has put up some gangster numbers in the
big leagues. If you've noticed, the Blue Jays opened the
roof for that game, and by the roof being open,
(15:34):
it changed the flight of the ball in many ways.
Look Varshow is a gold glove center fielder, and if
you looked at him throughout the course of the game,
I think he broke back on a Naylor swing that
ended up falling in front of him for a single.
And even I think Suarez hit a ball to center
on a line that he broke back on. He ended
up having a dive coming in, and then you have
(15:56):
the Garver triple. Mitch drove that ball to center. But
I think if you ask bar Show, let's a play
he has to make. You saw him get kind of
turned around and he end up kind of losing it
and missing it, ends up going off the wall. Garber
hits a triple, so now it's seven to three. They
drive him in. It makes it seven to three. This
another thing to pay attention to that there's another thing
that that differentiated from Game one, and they didn't have
(16:18):
the roof open in Game one, and even your home
players have trouble when when things like that happen. All
in all, this game, Nayler hits a two run homer
later in the game, makes it ten to three. The final.
Can't say enough about the Mariner's bullpen Mazardo Vargas through
four INNY combined of one hit baseball that's in October.
(16:40):
At any point in time in the season, that's amazing,
but in October that's even that's even more incredible. So
kudos to the Mariners all in all, again, coming off
the series they had and everybody had to be used,
and you don't see any ill effect at least bullpen
wise to the stuff. So that's something keeping on this
longer series. But you know, all in all, you hit
(17:02):
two three run homers on the road. And then add
a two run homer to it. You're gonna win a
lot of games, and you know Seattle's going home up
to nothing. Can't take your foot off the gas pedal
for Toronto, just kind of have to you know, whether
the storm, whether the storm, the crazy games are coming.
Usually the mid the middle three games of these series,
(17:25):
one of them turns into a eleven to ten game
right Game four in there three or four, the Bullpens
get get stressed a little bit. Three games in a
row for the first time in a while for both teams.
So this series is far from over. Yes, you'd rather
be up to nothing than down two, but you win
one game now, all of a sudden, it's a series.
(17:48):
So Toronto's they're not in a great spot. But I
truly believe they get going a little bit, score some
runs early, take some heat off the starters. They're gonna
be in good shape. You know. Game three should be
a good Moving on to the NLCS, we have the
Los Angeles Dodgers and all their star power against the
Milwaukee Brewers, who claimed to be a sum of average
(18:11):
Joe's They're not average. They're pretty damn good club. You
have Blake Snell in Game one against Aaron Ashby, Who's
going to be the opener, followed by Quinn Priester. This
had everything, had good defense, had some awful base running,
one of the craziest players you'll ever see and probably
never see again, and organize baseball, let alone, the major leagues.
(18:34):
Blake Snell is the complete story. I saw something on
Twitter last night as I'm kind of following the games
and checking on it pretty frequently, and Jason Stark posted
this on x He brought up a stat said, Blake
Snell since September tenth has faced one hundred and twenty
four hitters. He's given up fourteen hits. Like let that
(18:54):
sink in a second. I've been I'd say fortunate and
unfortunate to see Blake Snell all through the minor leagues.
Got to see him and a ball twice. Got to
see him in double A electric can command the fastball in.
One thing to look at was the home plate umpire
John Lipka set up over the inside part of the
(19:16):
plate to righty's so Blake Snell was getting the fastball
and the tick off the plate, which all it did
was open up the off speed away. It was a
clinic on how to pitch right handed hitters off speed,
change ups, fastballs in it was pretty damn special. A
couple of things stuck out to me. I still have
I still am am amazed that Mookie Betts only played
(19:41):
sixty five plus maybe sixty eight games at shortstop this
year and he's playing shortstop like he's never left. That
gets I know, you know, Mookie gets his gets all
the credit. He gets a ton of credit throughout the
league and throughout the country and throughout the media. But
as a former player, to be in the lead outfielder
and then just go ahead and move on into shortstop,
(20:04):
it's not that easy. And he's completely I mean, the gifted.
The fact that he's so talented to be able to
do that, I think, you know, at least I admire
the heck out of it. Those are two really difficult
positions that to switch back and forth the way he
does gives Dave Roberts so much flexibility and once he
wants to do with his lineup. But you know, to me,
this game was about Blake Snell and this top of
(20:27):
the I think it was the top of the fourth.
Now back it up, Tascar Hernandez and my opinion, should
have scored on the Edmund base hit the center. He
got a really bad jump. I feel like the Brewers
are playing up against the fence and the ball fell
in front of him. I thought he got a bad jump.
I get it. The ball over your head at second
base is probably the most difficult one to read err
(20:47):
on the side of caution with probably with that lineup
that makes sense to me. But it all boils down
to the bases loaded. Max Mounsey at the plate, and
my heart goes out to Max Munsey. It's just you
go from an almost grand slam to probably a double
to at least a sackfly till now I just I
just hit into a double play and one of the
(21:09):
most bizarre double plays you'll ever see in your life.
It's gonna go down eight six to two double play,
which put that in your bingo card. You'll never see
it again. To break it down, the ball hits the
center fielders glove, Freelick's glove, it bounces out and hits
the wall. Now to that point, I can understand as
(21:31):
a runner you can't see the ball hit off the
wall from there, but not knowing the rules of once
the ball hits the Outfitters mitt you're allowed to tag
and go, and if you watch the replay, Taska went,
took off, went back, tagged up again and waited and
then ran. It was it was bizarre, and it was
(21:52):
all over social media, people really not understanding what really happened.
The same thing. If you could, if you were watching
the game last night, if you could read Felix's lips,
I said the exact same thing, and I don't I
can't really repeat it, but it was it was what that,
you know, what just happened. And that's exactly was my
(22:13):
reaction was. We had total chaos, and I don't think
anyone really understood what to do. People wore blaming the umpire. Well,
you know, fans were like, well, why don't you look
at the umpire, the left field umpire. He got a call, right,
But played a lot of baseball games. I never tagged
up from third and looked to see where the left
field umpire was doing. Yeah, if it was down the
line of fair foul, yeah, but a lot going on
(22:36):
in that play. It really could have been devastating. Obviously,
you ride the momentum at home and the wave and
oh my gosh, what the heck just happened? And to me,
Blake Snell goes out in the bottom of the fourth
and is like, hold my beer, I'll be right back,
and like shut them down. One of the best shut
down innings without scoring that in that whole entire outing.
(22:56):
He just went out there and did his thing. One, two, three,
got the Dodgers back in top of the fifth, kik
leads off with a double. It just shows the resilience
of that club, right they're they're just they're veteran, they're
October battle tested. Nothing can phase them. That play in
itself can demoralize a club. It really can playoff game.
(23:21):
You're on the road, you know, you're just trying to
steal one. You've got Blake Snell dealing and that catastrophic
bad luck, whatever you want to call it, that's what
shows you how cruel baseball can be. That's it doesn't
get much cooler than that. And that's that's the beauty
of the game of baseball. Right there, You do everything
right and you don't get anything to show for. But
(23:44):
point is the Dodgers bounce back that could have easily
laid back sat back. They didn't score on the fifth
but you saw them keep coming and you know you
still nothing nothing. You get down to Freddie Freeman coming
up again, it's zero zero in my Freddy Freeman hit
a solo homer to put him up one nothing. Looking
at the the we talked about the home plate umpire,
(24:06):
and again their job is really hard. I get it.
The last thing you should have on the TV screen
is that stupid box, because now everybody's an umpire, and
everybody just thinks it's so easy to sit back there
and stare at three hundred pitches that are coming at
you and not flinch and be able to get them
all right. It's almost impossible. Two to one to me,
is that is the pitch. That's that's the key to that.
(24:27):
At batu it was a It was a ball in
that was off the plate that could have went either way.
Freddy took it was called a ball, so now we
can kind of he can eliminate that, and that's what
good hitters do. He got fouled off a fastball away.
The next pitch he tried to come inside three to
two and it caught too much of the plate. And
(24:49):
that's what great hitters do. They just know the strike zone.
Freddy got to clicked it and you know, didn't didn't
murder it, but he got enough of it to hit
it out. It just shows you that lineups were relentless,
and the Brewers pitched about as well as they could
pitch and to keep that game close, and against Blake Snell,
who's not giving up anything. Blake Snell's playing chess, and
(25:11):
everybody else is, you know, the all Adage playing checkers.
But I don't think I think checkers is too complicated
for that. It doesn't do it justice for what Blake
Snell's doing to this doing to this offense, because this
offense is dangerous. The Brewers, they don't need a lot,
they need a walk and error. All of a sudden,
here they come. So Blake goes eight strong innings, one
(25:33):
hundred and one pitches, and I know, if you're if
you're Dave Roberts, you gotta feel ex static, right, You've
got eight innings. This leads us to the ninth. Dodgers
scratch out an insurance run on a Mookie Bett's basis.
Loaded walk shows you the presence of Otani what that does,
and then you've got another MVP right behind him. So
the Dodgers score two runs. It shows you, now, uh,
(25:57):
that extra run magical. One. Nothing in the ninth is two.
Nothing is way better than one in the ninth inning.
Bring in Roki Sasaki, who was pretty much dominant in
the Philly series. But it ties into I think Derek
Jeter said it best on one of the postgame shows.
Any time you get a starter who's doing that to
(26:19):
you out of the game, it doesn't matter who you
bring in. This is where the analytic people don't understand this.
There is some human side to this game. They don't
understand the emotional, the mental, the thought, the confidence factor
you get when you have a guy like that and
you take him out of the game, and whoever you
(26:39):
bring in, it doesn't matter if you're oh for fifteen
or over twenty against him, you feel like you have
a better chance against him than what you just saw
for the last eight innings. I don't know. I know
I managed against Blake Snell in the minor leagues. He
was always three innings, three to five innings was his max,
and that's what But he threw one hundred and one
pitches last night. He could have went out in the nine.
(27:00):
I know as Dave Roberts. I know you feel like
he's done enough, and he did, and I understand that,
but one hundred pitches is not that much knowing. But
I also know the other side of it. You feel
like Blake Snell, if you're managing the Dodgers, you feel
like Blake Snell has at least two, maybe three more starts.
The year's not over yet, so you got to feel
(27:21):
pretty confident. Either way, you send Blake Snell back out there,
or you have Roki Susaki come in and close the
door and it's and it's game over. But you could
tell a first first hitter pops up, it was Durbin.
Durbin pops up one out. Okay, now you have one out,
nobody on up to nothing works a walk to Collins.
Jake Bowers comes up, pinch hits, and it shows you
(27:44):
how the game of baseball works. One pitch matters, and
the chess game that goes on between pitcher and hitter.
You have Jake Bowers three to one. Roki Sasaki throws
a nasty split. He gets kind of a really ugly
kind of half check swing to it, and you start
using your hitter brain, going three to two, I know
(28:04):
he doesn't want to walk me, but if he threw
it three to one, he might throw it three to two.
And that's the cat and mouse. He does it. He
throws a fastball, credit to Jake Bowers. He blasts it
off the centerfield wall. Now you have second and third.
Now you have second and third, and now the wheels
are spinning right. So here we go. Got second, third, cheerios.
Up hits a sack fly. Dangerous hitter, had some big
(28:26):
moments already in his postseason. He's only twenty four years old.
Ends up getting a sack fly. And then you got
your mister franchise. You got Christian Yellich Up. You're feeling
pretty good about yourself. Yellis walks. Now the winning runs
on base, so Doc goes to his pen again, brings
in Blake Trennon, who last year at this time was
(28:48):
as good as it gets. This year not so much.
But he wiggles out of it. Yelli's steals second. That
puts a lot of pressure. Now the winning run is
it second? Contraras hell of the player great at bat
ends up walking, and Tehrang ends up coming up, and
he chases a bad pitch up and he gets the
(29:08):
strikeout and that ends the game. But it just shows
you how crazy it can be at the end, that
a team can be getting dominated almost facing the minimum
the whole way through the game and one swing and
the Dodgers all that good work that Blake Snell did
was out the window. But this story is Blake Snell
(29:29):
absolutely dominating and the craziest double play you'll ever see.
That shows you that you might never see that again.
You probably won't. But it pays to know the rules
as a player, as a coach, as a base runner,
it really pays to know the rules. But that being said,
this is going to be one hell of the series.
(29:50):
I thought the Brewers pitching did a phenomenal job of
holding inn at bay throughout the game. That game could
have got away from them many times, but they made
clutch pitches at the right time. But this is gonna
be a really good series, expected to go be a
long series. But like I said, Blake Snell is on
a whole other planet right now, and it says something
about I know, through the regular season, everybody wants to
(30:15):
see their starters throw thirty two starts or whatever. But obviously,
if you're a bigger market club. Obviously, the Dodgers have money.
You can overcome having Blake Snell miss half the year.
But this is the bonus of when you're let's say
aces miss half the year, because when it gets to October,
they're fresh and this is mid season for him. So yes,
(30:38):
I don't think the Brewers have the ability to overcome
injuries like that because of the market. There's something to
be said about starting pitchers that are dominant that maybe
have missed a couple months in the beginning of the
year and now they're just rolling into this and it's
working on as a positive for the Dodgers. Looking forward
to Game two tonight and hopefully many more, just like
(30:59):
last night. All right, everybody, that's going to wrap up
this episode of The Dugout. Thank you for listening. Come
find us on Apple, Spotify, or wherever else you find
your favorite podcast. Check us out on social media x Instagram, Facebook,
leave a question, leave a comment, Love to hear you guys, feedback,
maybe for a future episode or whatever. Until then, thank
(31:21):
you for listening and look forward to the next one.
Welcome back everybody. I'm Doug man Kaviage and this is
the Dugout Podcast. We're basically going to break down the
alcs between the Toronto Blue Jays and the Seattle Mariners.
A couple thoughts going into this series? For me? Is
there any Game five hangover for the Mariners? Good or bad?
(00:20):
That's a tough I mean fourteen fifteen means of mental grind.
Use three starting pitchers and every member of your bullpen
for the most part. Throw that in with one day off,
travel over two thousand miles. Anybody that's been in the
postseason knows how mentally draining these playoffs. Each individual playoff
(00:42):
game is, let alone, a series clincher the way they
clinched it at home and have to travel across the
whole country to land in Toronto with only one day off.
What's Seattle going to do with their pitching? We talked
about it using three starters in Game five? Where does
it it makes it tough to find a rotation for
(01:03):
a seven game series? Also, do the Blue Jays stay
hot offensively? Do they? You know there's a couple of
days off. What's that due to their rhythm? What's that
due to you know, offensively, they were hotter than a firecracker.
I mean dominated the home series, really should have swept
the Yankees. Moving forward, you don't know what you're gonna get.
(01:25):
You know, is Bobushet gonna play big? If you knock
out ninety four RBIs out of anybody's lineup, that's gonna
be tough to replace again. Seven game series they are
way different than five game series. And also how effective
is Gosman and your Savage going to be with their
splits against the left handed hitting hitters from the Mariners? Right,
(01:45):
you're talking Polanco cal Rally, Crawford, cal Zone. How are
they going to match up against a split dominated Game one?
In game two? Move on to game one, you have
Toronto throwing Gosmen, which was no surprise. Seattle goes to
Bryce Miller. Now he's never thrown on short rest. This
(02:07):
game has a lot of implications for the seven game series.
Like I said before, the Mariners through three starting pitchers.
In Game five, you have a guy who hasn't never
thrown on short rest. You don't know how long you're
gonna get out of him. You're probably thinking the beginning,
if you can get three or four innings out of him.
Anything after that is golden. To protect the pen in
(02:29):
a seven game series, who was probably already running on fumes.
So boom you get, You get the top of the first,
You get the right guy that play and jare Palanco
first and third. I think the Mariners. The Mariners game
plan was to swing early, be aggressive. The splits late
in account are deadly. They all saw what he did
against the Yankee, so guarantee their game plan was the
(02:51):
first straight thing they see, we're attacking, get it up
and see what happens. And the right guy to play
in Polanco first and third. He gets a split, kind
of nubs it off the end of the back to the third,
get the force out at home. Osman seemed a little
shaky in the beginning, which most good starting pitchers seem
to have a trouble with the first I know you've
(03:11):
heard me say this before this podcast, everything, every time
we played a big game. As a manager, I told
our guys survived the first inning. If we can survive
the first inning and make it a game, we'll be fine.
He survives the first he goes three to zero on
the leadoff hitter, doesn't really have it finds a way
to wiggle out of it, gives up two hits, ends
up not giving up a run, so he gets out
of it, gives his boys a chance come in. Bottom
(03:33):
of the first first pitch of the game, Springer hits
it out at the right center and you're thinking, okay,
here come the Blue Jays again. They stayed hot. This
is it's gonna be. It's gonna be a long night
for the Mariners. They get a couple of guys on
after the homer, cal rally goes to the mound. Obviously
whatever he said was magical because he calmed down. He
ends up wiggling out of it, only giving up one.
(03:56):
So it's one nothing, and you saw both starters settle down,
cruising for the most part up until the sixth inning.
The sixth inning rolls around top of the six, cal
rallies up, gets behind two to zero. A split that
was borderline in could have been a ball, could have
been a strike. He calls a strike two to one,
kind of chased one down in a little bit and
(04:17):
another split. You could tell that, you know he was
definitely I don't I want to say with one hundred
percent agree that he's sitting on it. I don't know,
he'd never admit that, but it looked like he was
on it. It just was too far inside to two
does another split, catches some of the plate, and he
clicks it in the right field. Now he got a
whole new ball game. It's one to one. You got
(04:39):
Julio Rodriguez ends up walking with two outs, give up
a wild pitch, slash pass ball, and Schneider comes out
and brings in Ran a little the left hander. I
understand why right you turn Polanco around. He could probably say,
I'd like to have left Polanco left handed. I think
with to me the he was swinging it from what
(05:01):
it looked like. You turn him around, which again, over
his course of his career, he's better left handed. In
my opinion, he is right handed. But I understand why
you have Polonko, who's a switch hitter, so you turn
him around right handed with two outs, and if he
loses Polonko, he's got Naylor, a left hander on deck,
so it protects him that way too. But Polonko, once again,
(05:23):
they find a way to get him to the plate
in the right situations and he delivers, goes up. Two
to one changes everything you go back to Bryce Miller,
Who's I think he retired seventeen of eighteen at one
point and just kept going. I mean, what a magical job.
This kid did six innings, two hits, three walks, three strikeouts,
(05:43):
seventy six pitches. Dan Wilson obviously must have been ecstatic.
That was a magical job. Not only does he keep
them in Game one with a chance to win, but
he also limits the amount of times he has to
go to the pen, and add too that he pretty
much dominates a lineup that was as hot as anybody
(06:04):
in the postseason. Go forward, you end up going, You
end up getting another run. You get Polanco up again
with first and third left handed, he gets a single.
I love the postseason just for this reason. Guys. I
know hojre Plonko. I got to work with him for
a long time. The demeanor, the he always stays within himself,
and it just seems like the how they find a
way to get him to the plate in situations that
(06:26):
that that get a chance, he gets a chance to
shine without doing too much. He stays with himself, he
doesn't get it overwhelmed by the by the situation. He
just goes up there and has it gives you a
quality at bat, and he comes to again. Uh, don't
want to estimate the stolen bases by Rose Arena. To me,
he's over swinging a little bit. But you know, anybody
(06:46):
that hits ten home runs in twenty playoff games is
pretty special. You're kind of waiting for his moment. But
he's steals second, he steals third, ends up scoring the
insurance run, you call it to make it three. And
the main thing that stuck out to me in this game,
you look at the bullpens. Seattle brought in, Gay's fire
(07:07):
eight pitches, Matt Brash eight pitches, Munos the closer eight pitches.
To win a playoff game where your team only throws
one hundred pitches is almost I haven't looked it up,
but it has to be somewhat of a record, especially
in today's world where command has been thrown out the window.
(07:30):
And to throw a complete game using what four guys
and only throwing one hundred pitches shows you not only
they were pounding the strike zone, but they were pounding
the strike zone with quality pitches. To only give up
two hits to a team that was hotter than anyone,
is this could not have gone any better for the
(07:53):
Seattle Mariners. Guys only thrown eight pitches. It probably it
takes you at least twenty plus to get ready to
go in the game. They only have to throw eight
pitches in a game, really sets them up well. Now
it's just a matter of do the starters have enough
in the tank to kind of fall back in line.
But I can't say enough about Bryce Miller. He set
them up perfectly for this. That performance hopefully doesn't go
(08:16):
unnoticed whether this whether Seattle wins or loses this series.
You can't underestimate what he just did for his franchise
because that was that was nothing short of perfection for
him to go out and do that, and and to
finish that job, to get him six strong innings and
have a and save the rest of the rest of
(08:37):
the rotation and save the rest of the pitchers for
their for their team, and they're set up pretty well
moving in the game too. We move on the game
two of the ALCS between the Mariners and the Blue Jays.
You have Logan Gilbert throwing again with for the Mariners,
and you have Trey of Savage thrown for the Blue Jays.
The Savage coming off as good at outing as you
can possibly have in the postseason against the Yankees and
(08:59):
the ald S Y. Look, it's a completely different situation
pitching game two of a series that you're up one
nothing at home versus down one nothing at home in
the next series. I've always talked about this on this podcast.
Used to tell my guys as a manager, survived the
first inning, if you can survive the first inning to
make it a game, Usually guys settle down and it
becomes a baseball game again. The Mariners don't allow that.
(09:22):
A Rosarana gets hit by pitch on a three to
two count. Next batter cal rally, he walks. Now you
have Julio Rodriguez who's one two. The Savage hangs a
split and Julio deposits it in the left field. Now
you're down three to nothing right out of the shoot.
Before the game really even gets started. He ends up
finding a way to get out of that inning. So
you're up three to nothing in October after winning game
(09:44):
one on the road, huge take the crowd out of
the game. Out of the shoot. Now you're rolling, you
have momentum, and you make it so it's almost like
here we go again. The Blue Jays had to answer
in the bottom half. To their credit, they did. There's
not probably not a better guy in October you'd want
leading off in that situation than George Springer. He just
(10:07):
misses hitting a home run again for back to back games,
ends up refocusing hits a double in the gap. So
now you have a guy at second, nobody out. Nathan
Lucas hits a ground ball, does his job right, gets
him over to third. Look, I love Naylor as a player.
I think he's a really good hitter, really good fielder.
All around game is really good. He's showing the world
(10:29):
that you don't have to be blazingly fast to steal
bases at any level. He does everything pretty much right
as far as fundamentally, except for this. To me, this
is a play. It's a chopper to first. It's an
in between ball between first and second, and he kind
of gives it the quick double play feed from a
second baseman with a pitcher on the run. That's a
(10:50):
tough play. He ends up throwing it away. Now Springer scores.
Now you have the same situation with nobody out and
a man at second, and it's only three to one
look nothing lead air. On the side of caution, you
almost assume that runner at second's gonna score, so it's
three to one. Try to keep the bases clean. I'm
not saying it's not that's that was the only way
(11:12):
he could do it. I felt like he could have
got a little more, a little more safe of a
play than thrown it away. In that regard, that's a
very overlooked play. As a first basement, first basement and
the second basement, communication is huge. We work on it
at every level. We teach our second basements to call
the first basement off as soon as he can. Look.
I get it, it's October. There's fifty thousand people in
(11:33):
the stands. It's probably hard to hear. But the second
baseman can call off just like you would have a
pop up. You need to call off the first basement
on the ground ball. You call it early, the first
baseman goes back to the bag. As a first basement,
we are taught to keep the pitcher out of the
play as much as possible, and just for that reason,
they're flying over there. Usually they're late. I think we've
(11:55):
seen it recently in October. How not covering first has
led to a lot of crooked numbers and led to
some teams going home. So it's an important play in
the first inning. Kudos to the Blue Jays for answering
Kirk with a huge two out hit to make it
three to two. You know, you come out of that
after a three and Homer only down one outstanding from
(12:16):
the looks of it, to me, both starters looked like
they made pitches, but they were grinding through it a
little bit. They didn't quite have and I mean understandably.
So you know, Gilbert's got to throw how many two
innings in relief the of game five? And you know
there pitchers are creatures of habit, and if they don't
get their usual work, it's kind of switched off, and
(12:39):
you don't get the bullpens, and it does change some things.
But you know, he made pitches when he had to.
You know, you going to the bottom of the second, Lucas,
it's another clutch base hit the Tiler game at three.
Now it's zero zero, right, it's three three, Moving on,
Neither pitcher seems to be really separating themselves. You move
on to the fourth. I thought it was a great
(13:00):
move by Dan Wilson to get Gilbert out of there.
He could tell, like I said, he made pitches when
he had to, but it just didn't look like it
had a lot. There was a lot of smoothness to it.
He didn't seem easy, like every pitch was a grind.
And you know, Dan Wilson being one of the best
catchers of his generation, I think he understood that and
they made them move and it worked accordingly. On that
(13:21):
same token, we just credited Dan Wilson for pulling Gilbert
in the fourth and making a move. I feel like
Schneider pulled a starter two nights in a row too soon. Sure,
Savage gave up a home run to Julio Rodriguez, but
he hung a split and that's usually balls that get
left up over the middle of the plate in October
end up over the fence. It's not doesn't mean the
(13:43):
matchup was bad. The execution was poor, and you got
to tip your hat to the other guy who actually
hit it over the fence and gave up a homer.
Good hitters do that. So Varlin comes out, strikes out
Julio Rodriguez, and my I'm sitting there watching the game, going, okay,
that's a I feel like, that's a better matchup for Julio,
But Jorge Polanko is on deck and the Savage kind
(14:06):
of handled Polonko a little bit the first two times.
So you bring in Varlin, you know, yes, he's he
does punch out who who your right Riguez in that situation.
But to me, as as Horay is walking up in Polanco,
I'm saying this is a good matchup for hore here.
Sure enough, he does it again, hits a homer right
center field. It's it's twin on twin crime. Both of
(14:28):
them have played for the Twins before. So one thing
I've coached Polonko I've seen him over the years. Splits
and changeups are are his are his kryptonite when he's
when he's not one hundred percent locked in. He can
hit a fastball with anybody. He can hit a breaking
ball with anybody. The split and the change up, can
you kind of get that spinny kind of spirals himself
(14:49):
into the ground. It's just the way he is because
he doesn't have a lot of movement, and he doesn't
move so it's it can that third that third speed,
that third pitch tends to get him. So I felt
like that that's the ross configuration, right. We talk about
roster management, we talk about roster talking about lineup configuration.
Where he is hitting behind Julio makes a lot of
sense to me, So kudos to Polanco. Does it again,
(15:12):
three run Homer puts him up sixty three six three
m's in the fifth and you're feeling pretty good. Another
key point for me, I know what six to three
Mariner's pinch it. Mitch Garver, really good right handed hitter
has been has put up some gangster numbers in the
big leagues. If you've noticed, the Blue Jays opened the
roof for that game, and by the roof being open,
(15:34):
it changed the flight of the ball in many ways.
Look Varshow is a gold glove center fielder, and if
you looked at him throughout the course of the game,
I think he broke back on a Naylor swing that
ended up falling in front of him for a single.
And even I think Suarez hit a ball to center
on a line that he broke back on. He ended
up having a dive coming in, and then you have
(15:56):
the Garver triple. Mitch drove that ball to center. But
I think if you ask bar Show, let's a play
he has to make. You saw him get kind of
turned around and he end up kind of losing it
and missing it, ends up going off the wall. Garber
hits a triple, so now it's seven to three. They
drive him in. It makes it seven to three. This
another thing to pay attention to that there's another thing
that that differentiated from Game one, and they didn't have
(16:18):
the roof open in Game one, and even your home
players have trouble when when things like that happen. All
in all, this game, Nayler hits a two run homer
later in the game, makes it ten to three. The final.
Can't say enough about the Mariner's bullpen Mazardo Vargas through
four INNY combined of one hit baseball that's in October.
(16:40):
At any point in time in the season, that's amazing,
but in October that's even that's even more incredible. So
kudos to the Mariners all in all, again, coming off
the series they had and everybody had to be used,
and you don't see any ill effect at least bullpen
wise to the stuff. So that's something keeping on this
longer series. But you know, all in all, you hit
(17:02):
two three run homers on the road. And then add
a two run homer to it. You're gonna win a
lot of games, and you know Seattle's going home up
to nothing. Can't take your foot off the gas pedal
for Toronto, just kind of have to you know, whether
the storm, whether the storm, the crazy games are coming.
Usually the mid the middle three games of these series,
(17:25):
one of them turns into a eleven to ten game
right Game four in there three or four, the Bullpens
get get stressed a little bit. Three games in a
row for the first time in a while for both teams.
So this series is far from over. Yes, you'd rather
be up to nothing than down two, but you win
one game now, all of a sudden, it's a series.
(17:48):
So Toronto's they're not in a great spot. But I
truly believe they get going a little bit, score some
runs early, take some heat off the starters. They're gonna
be in good shape. You know. Game three should be
a good Moving on to the NLCS, we have the
Los Angeles Dodgers and all their star power against the
Milwaukee Brewers, who claimed to be a sum of average
(18:11):
Joe's They're not average. They're pretty damn good club. You
have Blake Snell in Game one against Aaron Ashby, Who's
going to be the opener, followed by Quinn Priester. This
had everything, had good defense, had some awful base running,
one of the craziest players you'll ever see and probably
never see again, and organize baseball, let alone, the major leagues.
(18:34):
Blake Snell is the complete story. I saw something on
Twitter last night as I'm kind of following the games
and checking on it pretty frequently, and Jason Stark posted
this on x He brought up a stat said, Blake
Snell since September tenth has faced one hundred and twenty
four hitters. He's given up fourteen hits. Like let that
(18:54):
sink in a second. I've been I'd say fortunate and
unfortunate to see Blake Snell all through the minor leagues.
Got to see him and a ball twice. Got to
see him in double A electric can command the fastball in.
One thing to look at was the home plate umpire
John Lipka set up over the inside part of the
(19:16):
plate to righty's so Blake Snell was getting the fastball
and the tick off the plate, which all it did
was open up the off speed away. It was a
clinic on how to pitch right handed hitters off speed,
change ups, fastballs in it was pretty damn special. A
couple of things stuck out to me. I still have
I still am am amazed that Mookie Betts only played
(19:41):
sixty five plus maybe sixty eight games at shortstop this
year and he's playing shortstop like he's never left. That
gets I know, you know, Mookie gets his gets all
the credit. He gets a ton of credit throughout the
league and throughout the country and throughout the media. But
as a former player, to be in the lead outfielder
and then just go ahead and move on into shortstop,
(20:04):
it's not that easy. And he's completely I mean, the gifted.
The fact that he's so talented to be able to
do that, I think, you know, at least I admire
the heck out of it. Those are two really difficult
positions that to switch back and forth the way he
does gives Dave Roberts so much flexibility and once he
wants to do with his lineup. But you know, to me,
this game was about Blake Snell and this top of
(20:27):
the I think it was the top of the fourth.
Now back it up, Tascar Hernandez and my opinion, should
have scored on the Edmund base hit the center. He
got a really bad jump. I feel like the Brewers
are playing up against the fence and the ball fell
in front of him. I thought he got a bad jump.
I get it. The ball over your head at second
base is probably the most difficult one to read err
(20:47):
on the side of caution with probably with that lineup
that makes sense to me. But it all boils down
to the bases loaded. Max Mounsey at the plate, and
my heart goes out to Max Munsey. It's just you
go from an almost grand slam to probably a double
to at least a sackfly till now I just I
just hit into a double play and one of the
(21:09):
most bizarre double plays you'll ever see in your life.
It's gonna go down eight six to two double play,
which put that in your bingo card. You'll never see
it again. To break it down, the ball hits the
center fielders glove, Freelick's glove, it bounces out and hits
the wall. Now to that point, I can understand as
(21:31):
a runner you can't see the ball hit off the
wall from there, but not knowing the rules of once
the ball hits the Outfitters mitt you're allowed to tag
and go, and if you watch the replay, Taska went,
took off, went back, tagged up again and waited and
then ran. It was it was bizarre, and it was
(21:52):
all over social media, people really not understanding what really happened.
The same thing. If you could, if you were watching
the game last night, if you could read Felix's lips,
I said the exact same thing, and I don't I
can't really repeat it, but it was it was what that,
you know, what just happened. And that's exactly was my
(22:13):
reaction was. We had total chaos, and I don't think
anyone really understood what to do. People wore blaming the umpire. Well,
you know, fans were like, well, why don't you look
at the umpire, the left field umpire. He got a call, right,
But played a lot of baseball games. I never tagged
up from third and looked to see where the left
field umpire was doing. Yeah, if it was down the
line of fair foul, yeah, but a lot going on
(22:36):
in that play. It really could have been devastating. Obviously,
you ride the momentum at home and the wave and
oh my gosh, what the heck just happened? And to me,
Blake Snell goes out in the bottom of the fourth
and is like, hold my beer, I'll be right back,
and like shut them down. One of the best shut
down innings without scoring that in that whole entire outing.
(22:56):
He just went out there and did his thing. One, two, three,
got the Dodgers back in top of the fifth, kik
leads off with a double. It just shows the resilience
of that club, right they're they're just they're veteran, they're
October battle tested. Nothing can phase them. That play in
itself can demoralize a club. It really can playoff game.
(23:21):
You're on the road, you know, you're just trying to
steal one. You've got Blake Snell dealing and that catastrophic
bad luck, whatever you want to call it, that's what
shows you how cruel baseball can be. That's it doesn't
get much cooler than that. And that's that's the beauty
of the game of baseball. Right there, You do everything
right and you don't get anything to show for. But
(23:44):
point is the Dodgers bounce back that could have easily
laid back sat back. They didn't score on the fifth
but you saw them keep coming and you know you
still nothing nothing. You get down to Freddie Freeman coming
up again, it's zero zero in my Freddy Freeman hit
a solo homer to put him up one nothing. Looking
at the the we talked about the home plate umpire,
(24:06):
and again their job is really hard. I get it.
The last thing you should have on the TV screen
is that stupid box, because now everybody's an umpire, and
everybody just thinks it's so easy to sit back there
and stare at three hundred pitches that are coming at
you and not flinch and be able to get them
all right. It's almost impossible. Two to one to me,
is that is the pitch. That's that's the key to that.
(24:27):
At batu it was a It was a ball in
that was off the plate that could have went either way.
Freddy took it was called a ball, so now we
can kind of he can eliminate that, and that's what
good hitters do. He got fouled off a fastball away.
The next pitch he tried to come inside three to
two and it caught too much of the plate. And
(24:49):
that's what great hitters do. They just know the strike zone.
Freddy got to clicked it and you know, didn't didn't
murder it, but he got enough of it to hit
it out. It just shows you that lineups were relentless,
and the Brewers pitched about as well as they could
pitch and to keep that game close, and against Blake Snell,
who's not giving up anything. Blake Snell's playing chess, and
(25:11):
everybody else is, you know, the all Adage playing checkers.
But I don't think I think checkers is too complicated
for that. It doesn't do it justice for what Blake
Snell's doing to this doing to this offense, because this
offense is dangerous. The Brewers, they don't need a lot,
they need a walk and error. All of a sudden,
here they come. So Blake goes eight strong innings, one
(25:33):
hundred and one pitches, and I know, if you're if
you're Dave Roberts, you gotta feel ex static, right, You've
got eight innings. This leads us to the ninth. Dodgers
scratch out an insurance run on a Mookie Bett's basis.
Loaded walk shows you the presence of Otani what that does,
and then you've got another MVP right behind him. So
the Dodgers score two runs. It shows you, now, uh,
(25:57):
that extra run magical. One. Nothing in the ninth is two.
Nothing is way better than one in the ninth inning.
Bring in Roki Sasaki, who was pretty much dominant in
the Philly series. But it ties into I think Derek
Jeter said it best on one of the postgame shows.
Any time you get a starter who's doing that to
(26:19):
you out of the game, it doesn't matter who you
bring in. This is where the analytic people don't understand this.
There is some human side to this game. They don't
understand the emotional, the mental, the thought, the confidence factor
you get when you have a guy like that and
you take him out of the game, and whoever you
(26:39):
bring in, it doesn't matter if you're oh for fifteen
or over twenty against him, you feel like you have
a better chance against him than what you just saw
for the last eight innings. I don't know. I know
I managed against Blake Snell in the minor leagues. He
was always three innings, three to five innings was his max,
and that's what But he threw one hundred and one
pitches last night. He could have went out in the nine.
(27:00):
I know as Dave Roberts. I know you feel like
he's done enough, and he did, and I understand that,
but one hundred pitches is not that much knowing. But
I also know the other side of it. You feel
like Blake Snell, if you're managing the Dodgers, you feel
like Blake Snell has at least two, maybe three more starts.
The year's not over yet, so you got to feel
(27:21):
pretty confident. Either way, you send Blake Snell back out there,
or you have Roki Susaki come in and close the
door and it's and it's game over. But you could
tell a first first hitter pops up, it was Durbin.
Durbin pops up one out. Okay, now you have one out,
nobody on up to nothing works a walk to Collins.
Jake Bowers comes up, pinch hits, and it shows you
(27:44):
how the game of baseball works. One pitch matters, and
the chess game that goes on between pitcher and hitter.
You have Jake Bowers three to one. Roki Sasaki throws
a nasty split. He gets kind of a really ugly
kind of half check swing to it, and you start
using your hitter brain, going three to two, I know
(28:04):
he doesn't want to walk me, but if he threw
it three to one, he might throw it three to two.
And that's the cat and mouse. He does it. He
throws a fastball, credit to Jake Bowers. He blasts it
off the centerfield wall. Now you have second and third.
Now you have second and third, and now the wheels
are spinning right. So here we go. Got second, third, cheerios.
Up hits a sack fly. Dangerous hitter, had some big
(28:26):
moments already in his postseason. He's only twenty four years old.
Ends up getting a sack fly. And then you got
your mister franchise. You got Christian Yellich Up. You're feeling
pretty good about yourself. Yellis walks. Now the winning runs
on base, so Doc goes to his pen again, brings
in Blake Trennon, who last year at this time was
(28:48):
as good as it gets. This year not so much.
But he wiggles out of it. Yelli's steals second. That
puts a lot of pressure. Now the winning run is
it second? Contraras hell of the player great at bat
ends up walking, and Tehrang ends up coming up, and
he chases a bad pitch up and he gets the
(29:08):
strikeout and that ends the game. But it just shows
you how crazy it can be at the end, that
a team can be getting dominated almost facing the minimum
the whole way through the game and one swing and
the Dodgers all that good work that Blake Snell did
was out the window. But this story is Blake Snell
(29:29):
absolutely dominating and the craziest double play you'll ever see.
That shows you that you might never see that again.
You probably won't. But it pays to know the rules
as a player, as a coach, as a base runner,
it really pays to know the rules. But that being said,
this is going to be one hell of the series.
(29:50):
I thought the Brewers pitching did a phenomenal job of
holding inn at bay throughout the game. That game could
have got away from them many times, but they made
clutch pitches at the right time. But this is gonna
be a really good series, expected to go be a
long series. But like I said, Blake Snell is on
a whole other planet right now, and it says something
about I know, through the regular season, everybody wants to
(30:15):
see their starters throw thirty two starts or whatever. But obviously,
if you're a bigger market club. Obviously, the Dodgers have money.
You can overcome having Blake Snell miss half the year.
But this is the bonus of when you're let's say
aces miss half the year, because when it gets to October,
they're fresh and this is mid season for him. So yes,
(30:38):
I don't think the Brewers have the ability to overcome
injuries like that because of the market. There's something to
be said about starting pitchers that are dominant that maybe
have missed a couple months in the beginning of the
year and now they're just rolling into this and it's
working on as a positive for the Dodgers. Looking forward
to Game two tonight and hopefully many more, just like
(30:59):
last night. All right, everybody, that's going to wrap up
this episode of The Dugout. Thank you for listening. Come
find us on Apple, Spotify, or wherever else you find
your favorite podcast. Check us out on social media x Instagram, Facebook,
leave a question, leave a comment, Love to hear you guys, feedback,
maybe for a future episode or whatever. Until then, thank
(31:21):
you for listening and look forward to the next one.
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