Arguably the two best teams in baseball will face off in an early playoff round.
Depending on which odds you look at, the Los Angeles Dodgers are the favorite to repeat as World Series champions this year, while the Phillies are either the second or third choice to capture the title.
The two heavyweights, however, will match up in a titanic best-of-five National League Division Series showdown which begins Saturday night at 6:38 p.m. at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia.
The Phillies earned a first-round bye for the second straight year as National League East champions but finished behind the Milwaukee Brewers, who despite the betting odds not favoring them, finished with the best record in Major League Baseball which meant they could avoid playing the Phillies or Dodgers until the National League Championship Series.
The Dodgers won the National League West and needed to play a wild card series agains the Cincinnati Reds, which they won handily in two straight games.
The top two candidates for MVP - the Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani and Phillies’ Kyle Schwarber - who combined for 111 home runs and were the top two sluggers in the National League - will face off in this series. Ohtani, baseball’s only two-way player, is also scheduled to pitch in Game 1.
They are only part of the box office players who will compete in the series. The Dodgers feature shortstop Mookie Betts, first baseman Freddie Freeman and starting pitcher Blake Snell, while the Phillies will counter with the likes of shortstop Trea Turner, first baseman Bryce Harper and starting pitcher Cristopher Sanchez.
The Phillies defeated the Dodgers four out of six games this season and have won five straight series between the teams overall. Two of those three wins came a few weeks ago in Los Angeles where the Phillies rallied from three-run deficits twice, including in their National League East-clinching victory. The other series came in April when the Dodgers came in 8-0 and the Phillies won two of three.
The winner of this series will have cleared a major hurdle and will move forward as the favorite to win the championship.
The Phillies will win if ..... They can get into the Dodger bullpen. Los Angeles’ relievers are its Achilles heel. In the September series, the Phillies scored just one run in 17 2/3 innings against Dodger starting pitchers but 14 runs in 10 1/3 against the bullpen. Ohtani and Snell combined for 12 shutout innings in their two starts, and they project as the Game 1 and 2 starters. This is the Phillies’ fifth straight appearance in the postseason and in their last four eliminations, the offense has struggled at the wrong times, leading to their ouster. The Phillies finished the year relatively strong at the plate though had their hiccups - they were shut out by their former prospect Mick Abel and the Minnesota Twins in the penultimate game of the season. They’re going to need to put up four or five runs each game to give themselves a chance to win and while they’ve been a come-from-behind team, they don’t want to rely on that in the postseason.
The Dodgers will win if .... The top of their order sets the table for the offense. Ohtani leads off, followed by Betts and Freeeman. Betts looked lost for most of the season but he hit .288 in August and .299 with six home runs in September and was 6-for-9 in the division series as Los Angeles exploded for 18 runs in two games. Freeman also finished strong with 13 home runs and 34 RBI in the last two months of the season. By winning in two straight games against the Reds, the Dodgers were able to hold Ohtani for Game 1 of the NLDS. Coming off Tommy John surgery, Ohtani’s innings have been limited, but he may have a longer leash in the playoffs. If he, Snell and Yoshinobu Yamamoto can pitch into the seventh inning and shorten the game it would boost the Dodgers’ prospects.
X-Factor and prediction: The one area the Phillies have an advantage over the Dodgers is in the bullpen, but Los Angeles has some options to bolster that area. Starters Clayton Kershaw - who has announced his retirement at the end of this season - Tyler Glasnow and Emmet Sheehan will likely be available out of the bullpen and if they can produce in relief the Dodgers can avoid having to go deep into the relief corps. Home-field advantage could be the key. The Phillies have the best crowd in baseball and a distinct advantage at Citizens Bank Park, where Games 1, 2 and 5 will be held. Dodgers in five.
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Category: General Sports
