Oct 9-14: This is it. The old bitter rivalry revisited.
Game 1- Logan Webb vs. Buehler. Mookie starts off on the right foot by hitting sharply to the 4 hole for a hit. Seager is on by FC and works his way around to 3B, but is left when JT hits it hard up the middle but it catches Webb’s foot, gets ball knocked down, picked up and JT is thrown out. Then the next 6 go out in order, so 0 runs after 3. 4th Seager leads off with a swinging bunt single. Trea K. JT grounds into a spectacular DP 4-6-3. Smith leads off the 5th with a single, Beaty forces him, Belli long fly out, AJ K on a change — ugh. 6th Buehler leads off with a whiff (a bit of a surprise Walker hits). Seager finally gets a hit — a 2-out double. Trea another K. Dodgers look foolish, and are perishing. Will Smith ropes a 1-out double. Beaty and Belli swing and miss K’s on low sinkers — why swing at those? End of 7th with goose eggs. Dodgers’ bats sleeping as they come to bat in the 8th against crafty Webb. AJ and PH Lux hit dribblers for 2 outs. Mookie gets a pitch up and bangs a single to chase Webb. Last chance for Dodgers to avoid a shutout, let alone win, down 4-0. Heart of order coming up 3-4-5. Trea should bunt for a hit (why not?), but flies out meekly. JT check swing K. Smith pops up — shutout confirmed (sad!). Lose 4-0. Only 3 players got hits, 5 hits total (sad). We’ll likely see some lineup changes for game 2: with lefty going, Pujols at 1B and CT3 in CF (I predict).
Pitching: Buehler not a good start, as he gives up a walk and later a McCovey Cove 2-run blast by old nemesis Posey. Why do the Dodgers continue to pitch Posey high fastballs when he feasts on those (same as for JT, Muncy and Will Smith)? 2-0 after only 1. Buehler not yet in command of his best stuff but getting by. 2-0 after 3, then 4 (hit by Bryant is all). 5th another 1-hit inning. 6th side in order for 1st time. 7th Buehler feeds Bryant a center cut fastball and gone for 3rd run — a big run — to chase him. (Bryant already had 2 hits, so Walker should have been more careful.) In comes Bazooka Graterol, who rifles an easy 101 to K Webb and end the 7th at 3-0. Vesia in for the 8th, starts with a K. Flores skies a loud foul homer, then K’s (usually happens). Vesia serves up a curve into BC’s happy zone (he hit a long fly in 1st AB on a similar curve) for a nail-in-the-coffin homer for 4-0 (goodnight). Bickford gets Posey to ground out to end it. Giants out homer Dodgers 3-0.
Game 2- Lineup changes: Only CT3 for Beaty, but Belli stays (1B) — why? Mookie leadoff walk and steals 2B (yay). but stays there as Seager K’s (splitter), Turner and Turner fly out. Gausman spits out his gum before being checked by ump. Smith leadoff 109 laser snared off palm of glove by SS BCraw who holds onto it. CT3 ropes a double to the gap (right where he left off). Belli chases for a K. AJ gets IBB, to bring up Urias (a good hitter — tied for 1st in NL with 9 RBI). Wow! Julio gets a liner hit and drives in CT3 for 1-0. Mookie rockets another RBI hit for 2-0. Seager another splitter K. Dodgers seem to score runs for Urias (good thing). Dodgers get 2 more crooked numbers: 4 in a big 5th on a pair of big doubles by Belli (bases loaded) and AJ; and 3 more in the 7th on a homer by Smith, an RBI shift beat hit by PH Beaty, and another RBI single.
Pitching: 20-gamer Urias (Cy Young?) takes the hill. Julio has a Ruf start battling leadoff but gets a K call on a well located fastball. Next battling Briant: popup. Slater: 1st pitch center cut change pummeled for a double. Problem Posey: K on great pitches (nothing in the zone). no score after 1. Urias gave up a run on a double and sac fly in the 3rd, but that was all through 5.1 innings (1R, 3H). Kelly gave up a run in the 6th. Vesia, Graterol and Bickford finished the game giving up no runs.
So Dodgers win the must win game 2 by 9-2.
Game 3- I’m in attendance and getting blown away by the wind (holding onto my hat). The wind was the major story in this game: knocking down several long balls for each team that might otherwise have left the park. Without the wind, the score might have 5-3 Dodgers. As it was, Dodgers out hit the Giants 5-3. In fact, after Scherzer threw a great 7 (1R, 3H, 10K), Dodgers bullpen pitched a perfect 8th (Treinen) and 9th (Jansen). Should have been good enough to easily win, but due to a series of unfortunate plays Dodgers did not score — at all! 2nd shutout in 3 games (yech). Giants 1, Dodgers 0.
Game 4- Now a must win (or go home). Lineup changes: Lux for AJ (questionable), and Lux in CF instead of Taylor, who’s in left (more questionable); Belli at 1B for Pujols or Beaty. Smith moved up into 4 hole (was 8th last night), dropping JT down to 5th (not hitting so well). Mookie leads off with a long fly out, but Seager does well to go the other way for a hit. Trea lashes a hit to the RCF wall and scores Seager from 1B (yay). G Lux leads off 2nd with a banged hit. 7 hole find Belli, who repeats Lux’s hit and drives him to 3B to corner them with no outs. CT3 in a big spot, blasts a long sac fly to left, scoring Lux and moving up Belli for 2-0. Walker K’s, now Mookie with 2 outs hits a hard grounder to the 6 hole knocked down by BCraw to re-corner runners, as Belli holds at 3B. Giants starter DiSclafani is replaced (2nd inning!). Seager now in a big spot vs. a new pitcher, swings at a high pitch and flies out — still 2-0. New pitcher Castro gets Trea, but walks Smith and JT, then is replaced by LHP Garcia to face LH Lux and Belli. Lux also walks to load bases with 1 out. Belli in a big spot bounces meekly into a force at home. Now up to CT3 in 8 hole, and he works count full: CT bashes a deep fly to left and is robbed against the fence (darn it!). Lucky Giants keep it 2-0, as cold air kept that in the park (else a grand slam and game over). Walker leads off with an infield hit off pitcher. In Mookie’s 3rd AB he drills a ball into RF pavilion for 2-run homer — huge! Seager bangs a grounder to 1B for 1st out, causes a double switch. Trea K, Smith rips a double down the LF line, but stranded by JT fly out. 4-0. 5th hits by Lux and Belli again to corners, but CT3 bounces into rundown of Lux, leaving 1st and 2nd with 1 out. PH Souza walks (!) to load bases, Mookie long sac fly for 5-1. 6th Trea gets infield hit. But Smith and JT leave him. Side out in order on 3K’s in 7th. 8th, Seager leadoff hit, Trea long fly out. Will goes Bambino! Huge 2-run homer for 7-2 (yes!). Last man up is PH Pujols (crowd goes wild). Tio Albert flies out.
Pitching: Buehler on 3 days rest throws a very efficient 1st on only 11 pitches. Gets Posey to pop up, but gives up a hit to Bryant on a cookie. Followed by another hit on a mistake to corner runners with 1 out. Yay, gets K on good slider to Longoria. Lucky liner by Yaz down RF line was foul, then lucky again a fastball was lined to 2B, so no runs. 3rd leads off with PH Dickerson whom Buehler punches out on high cheese (96). LaStella flies out, xx K’s on a good slider. no runs through 3. Only 2-0, Buehler now has to go to work, and K’s BCraw, then faces Posey who smashes a 1-hopper to SS (good hands by Seager). Bryant walks on 4. LaMonte grounds out into shift. 2-0 then 4-0. 5th, Longo leadoff hit, then lineout to Betts in RF. Buehler struggling a bit now, walks Dugger on a close call, then Roberts pulls him (OK, this is a BIG game!), and brings in Kelly. Giants work for 1 run. 6th, Graterol escapes with 1 hit by hot Bryant. 5-1. 7th Vesia gets 2 outs, infield hit, relieved by Treinen who gets the final out a K. Treinen in 8th gives a leadoff double to BCraw on an elevated curve — BCraw feasts on those (bad pitch after a great curve that was missed). Crawford scores on a Bryant ground out for 5-2. Treinen nasty to PH for a K looking. 5-2 after 8. Jansen was for the 9th, but now that it is 7-2, Bickford is sent in to close, and he needs to slam the door on this one — and he does.
Dodgers win 7-2 to force a decisive game 5 at San Francisco — just as it should be. Both teams with franchise record 109 wins, and it comes down to ONE final game — seriously.
Game 5- For all the marbles, all hands on deck, there is no tomorrow. The game was an unbelievable dogfight, a grinder — no score through 5. Mookie led off with a roped single, and ended up going 4-4. Seager ripped one the other way but caught by the LFx. Good start, but then Trea grounded into a DP (and went 0-fer). Will Smith and JT also went hitless. Dodgers finally score 1 in the 6th, on a Mookie hit and a steal of 2B, followed by an RBI double to left by Seager. But Giants answer back immediately in bottom of inning with a 450-ft home run by Ruf on a 3-2 fastball down the middle (mistake by Urias). In the 8th, AJ PH infield bouncer for a hit, followed by Mookie grounder up the middle for another hit, but they were stranded by Seager on a K and Trea on fly out.
Tied 1-1 into the 9th, when the Dodgers squeak out another run: JT HBP, G Lux single, Belli single to score JT with winning run. With runners at the corners and 1 out, CT3 tries to bunt for a safety squeeze but pops it up. Then Beaty PH to ground out to 1B. 2-1 lead into the bottom of the 9th holds up for the win!
Pitching: Great plan to go with a pair of “openers”: Knebel for the 1st, Graterol for the 2nd. Then bring in Urias for the middle innings. Julio pitched great, but made a mistake to groove a 3-2 fastball to Ruf. Dodgers went with high leverage relief: Treinen in the 7th, Jansen in the 8th — both pitched great. But that left a hole for the rave9th. Enter Max Scherzer (on only 2 days test). He gets a fly out to left by BCraw, a Bryant grounder bobbled by JT at 3B for an error. (Some thought that signaled doom.) A called K on a great slider — 1 more out to get. Max gets ahead of Wilmer Flores 0-2, then hurls a slider for a check swing — but the 1B ump surprisingly calls a swing for strike 3! (Bad call, but Dodgers probably would have won anyway.)
Dodgers hold on to win 2-1 to advance to the NLCS vs. Braves and end the Giants magical season (at 109 wins).