October 6th, 2024
Will Leitch
@williamfleitchThe first day of the Division Series featured four thrilling games: If you chose wisely, you might just have watched baseball all day, without moving once. That’s a pretty good day.
- Get your postseason tickets!
Because the American League Division Series get an off-day, there are only two games on Sunday, but given what we know after seeing each Game 1, they’re even more compelling.
Here’s the top storyline for each of the four NLDS teams heading into Game 2.
Mets at Phillies (NYM leads 1-0)
4:08 p.m. ET, FS1
SP: Luis Severino (NYM) vs. Cristopher Sánchez (PHI)
Mets: How long can they keep floating on air like this?
So, let’s remind everyone what has happened in the past six days of New York Mets baseball:
- Monday vs. Braves: In the first game of a doubleheader, the Mets scored six runs in the eighth inning after falling behind, 3-0, then two more in the ninth after falling behind, 7-6, to clinch an NL Wild Card spot.
- Thursday vs. Brewers: The Mets scored four runs in the top of the ninth after falling behind, 2-0, in a winner-take-all Game 3 of the NL Wild Card Series, clinching a trip to the NLDS.
- Saturday vs. Phillies: Scored five runs in top of the eighth after falling behind 1-0 to win Game 1 of the NLDS.
That is … quite a week! The Mets are carrying themselves like nothing in the world can touch them right now, and why wouldn’t they? All three of those wins were the sort of victories that, if any of them happened in the regular season, would have a team soaring. To have all three occur in the same week, with everything on the line each time, will make a team feel invincible. If the Mets fall behind on Sunday, do you think they’re going to be sweating it one bit?
- Mets-Phillies NL Division Series Game 2 FAQ
Phillies: Can the bullpen recover from that?
To be as clear as possible here, the Phillies absolutely could not send Zack Wheeler back out for the eighth inning on Saturday. Yes, he had been brilliant, allowing one hit in seven innings, striking out nine and getting 30 swings and misses, the third most in a postseason game in the pitch-tracking era (since 2008). But he also had thrown 111 pitches, which -- because it is not 1987 -- is way too many pitches to justify sending a starting pitcher back out in the postseason, no matter how good he has been.
Still, you can forgive Phillies fans if, after that eighth inning, they’re still twitching a little bit every time they hear either the word “bull” or “pen.” That nightmare eighth has Phils fans reliving all sorts of past bullpen blowups, and you can understand if they’d like to see Sánchez -- who, hey, was one of three pitchers in the Majors to throw two complete games this year! -- go as far as humanly possible in this one. Or, at the very least, get the game to closer Carlos Estévez. Because Game 1? That’s an extremely brutal way to lose a baseball game.
Padres at Dodgers (LAD leads 1-0)
8:03 p.m. ET, FS1
SP: Yu Darvish (SD) vs. Jack Flaherty (LAD)
Padres: What can they expect out of Darvish?
Darvish made five starts in September after not pitching since Memorial Day, and he had his moments. He earned three wins and actually struck out nine batters in 6 1/3 innings in his penultimate start on Sept. 22. But he is still facing a frighteningly-locked-in Shohei Ohtani -- we’ll be watching that bat flip, or really that bat fling, for decades -- and a Dodgers lineup that knocked around Dylan Cease in Game 1.
- NLDS Game 5, presented by Booking.com: Friday, 8 p.m. ET/5 PT on FOX
The Padres’ primary advantage in this series is supposed to be their rotation, but now that they’ve lost Joe Musgrove to a UCL injury, the only way they hold on to that advantage is if Darvish can look closer to the guy who has made five All-Star teams and finished second in Cy Young Award voting twice. Dodgers fans have certainly seen Darvish struggle in a postseason game at Dodger Stadium before, thanks to that fateful Game 7 in the 2017 World Series. But he also has won a postseason game there since then -- and it was in the exact same situation, in Game 2 of the 2022 NLDS, after the Padres lost Game 1. That was the first of three straight San Diego victories to end that series. Can Darvish help history repeat itself?
Dodgers: How do they piece together innings now?
The Dodgers’ rotation injury issues are well documented at this point, and they are issues that aren’t going to be improving any time soon. They have what they have. At the very least, though, they had to have been hoping for a little bit more from Yoshinobu Yamamoto in Game 1 than three measly innings. The Dodgers had to power through five of their top bullpen arms to gut out Saturday's victory, and while those relievers were terrific -- they are, of course, the reason they won the game -- again, they had to use five of them. (Including 1 2/3 innings and 39 pitches from Blake Treinen, who got the save.)
That is an issue when they have to play again on Sunday and, as established, are already short on pitchers. That is a lot to put on Flaherty, who pitched well this season but also allowed 10 earned runs in 14 innings over his final three starts. But he really is just the tip of the spear at this point. L.A. will at least get an off-day before starting Walker Buehler in Game 3, but a solid outing by Flaherty would help the Dodgers feel like they aren't in danger of running out of pitchers before the series even makes it back to San Diego.