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Heroes, zeros and other observations from the Dodgers’ 7–4 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers in Game 2 of the National League Championship Series:
Zero: The whole Dodgers’ offense –– but especially Shohei Ohtani and Will Smith
Really, the 7-4 scoreline in Monday’s Game 2 loss flattered the Dodgers. They managed just three hits. All of their scoring required the help of either a wild pitch or a throwing error from Brewers starter Logan Henderson. And once Milwaukee turned to the bullpen, their relievers retired all 15 batters they faced the rest of the way.
Still, as has been the case all postseason, it was Ohtani and Smith whose struggles once again loomed largest.
From the Nos. 4-5 spots of the order –– after Smith was bumped down from the three-hole pregame –– they combined to go 0-for-8 with three strikeouts. Overall in the playoffs now, Ohtani is 3-for-20 without any extra-base hits, while Smith is now an unthinkable 1-for-23 with one walk and eight strikeouts.
Even worse for Smith, Monday included a couple of regrettable moments from behind the plate.
In both the first and third innings, Yoshinobu Yamamoto threw what should have been called third strikes against Brice Turang. But both times home plate umpire Chris Segal missed the call –– and, most crucially, Smith elected against trying to challenge.
Manager Dave Roberts didn’t want to second-guess his catcher postgame, while Yamamoto also described both pitches as being “too fine a line on the [edge of the] strike zone” to challenge.
Still, both times, they missed ABS chances backfired, with Turang doubling and later scoring in the first, then walking and later scoring in the third.
“It was kind of early in the game, we kind of had him on the ropes,” Smith said, explaining his thought process. “I figured we could get him out there [without risking the challenges].”
Hero: The Brewers’ bullpen
The Brewers’ bullpen also figured to be one of their strengths in this series.
But two games in, their dominance has shifted the scales of the series.
In Game 1, four Brewers relievers (DL Hall, Abner Uribe, Aaron Ashby and Trevor Megill) combined for 4 ⅔ scoreless innings while working out of several jams with a one-run lead.
In Game 2, the group was even more dominant, with four arms (Dustin May, JoJo Romero and Uribe and Ashby again) going 15 up, 15 down over five perfect closing innings.
The Dodgers’ hope is that, as the series wears on, their lineup will benefit from repeated looks at the group. However, they will have to find some sort of answer to the unit’s premium stuff first.
As of Monday night, Roberts was still searching for one.
“I know that they’ve got good arms,” Roberts said. “But I think they’re just finding ways to win pitches better than we are.”
Unsung hero
Fifteen months ago, the Dodgers traded May away as an excess piece of their pitching staff.
On Monday, he was the one Brewers pitcher to inherit some danger out of the bullpen, but found a way to limit damage in what would prove to be the Dodgers’ final rally.
After Henderson’s second error of the game –– on an errant throw while fielding a bunt from Tommy Edman –– allowed a tying run to score and left Edman standing on second, May retired Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman and Teoscar Hernández in order. Betts’ grounder did move Edman to third, while Freeman’s sacrifice fly got him home for a brief 4-3 lead.
But May’s performance set the tone for the rest of Milwaukee’s bullpen dominance.
And now, he could turn around and be available to start Game 4, in what would be his first outing back at Dodger Stadium since being shipped away by the team.
Key stat: Four
As in, the number of misses Yoshinobu Yamamoto generated from 33 Brewers swings.
The resulting 12% whiff rate was tied for the second-lowest of Yamamoto’s career. More consequentially, it stressed his pitch count and prompted his eventual early exit from the game, leaving too large a workload for the Dodgers’ bullpen (which gave up four runs in its 5 ⅓ innings of work) to withstand at a raucous American Family Field.
Quote of the night
“They had much better at-bats than we did across the board, top to bottom. And then they put the ball in play, created havoc. That’s what they do, and we didn’t do that.”
That was Roberts’ overall summation of the Dodgers’ Game 2 loss. It captured the many, but ultimately simple, reasons they find themselves facing a daunting two-game deficit as the series shifts back to Los Angeles for Game 3 on Wednesday night.