Here’s what happened on this date in baseball history. There were several bad things for the Dodgers (Bobby Thomson), but also a couple of good ones.
Both games are on the TBS cable channel.
The early game: Cardinals at Braves, 2:02 PM PDT
RHP Miles Mikolas goes for the Cards, while Dallas Keuchel goes for the Braves. This will be Mikolas’ first postseason appearance; it will be Keuchel’s 11th. Here’s MLB’s position-by-position comparison of the two teams. The net result? A very slight edge to the Braves. USA Today goes the other way and picks the Cardinals in five games.
Cardinals’ lineup:
Ready for Game 1!#NLDS | #TimeToFly pic.twitter.com/aiIpJaMOQn
— St. Louis Cardinals (@Cardinals) October 3, 2019
Braves’ lineup:
Let’s ride.#RELENTLESS pic.twitter.com/BMR41jalEu
— Atlanta Braves (@Braves) October 3, 2019
The late game: Nationals at Dodgers, 5:37 PM PDT
LHP Patrick Corbin makes the first postseason start of his career, but he’s not unfamiliar with the Dodgers. He’s made 21 lifetime appearances (19 starts) against them including a seven-inning scoreless outing in May and has a 3.36 ERA to show for it. RHP Walker Buehler has made four postseason starts, all last year. He started Game Seven of the NLCS against the Brewers and then went seven scoreless innings against the Red Sox in Game Three of the World Series.
Here’s MLB’s position-by-position analysis of the two teams. MLB gives the Dodgers a slight edge. USA Today agrees, picking the Dodgers in four games.
Nationals’ lineup:
Game Juan.#BeatLA // #STAYINTHEFIGHT pic.twitter.com/8EEqA5ufV6
— Washington Nationals (@Nationals) October 3, 2019
Dodgers’ lineup:
Tonight’s Gm. 1 Dodger lineup vs. Nationals:
Pollock LF
Freese 1B
Turner 3B
Bellinger CF
Taylor RF
Muncy 2B
Seager SS
Smith C
Buehler P#NLDS | #LABleedsBlue pic.twitter.com/YMkjwgwn1N— Los Angeles Dodgers (@Dodgers) October 3, 2019
Kelly. I like it.
Good use of him at this point.
That’s what was said about Lux and things worked out real well
I thought Gomes was a potential Dodger last off-season, but he started out poorly this year. He was very good when Suzuki went down with an injury, though, as the Nats took charge in the mild card race.
It will be interesting to see what the Dodgers do this off season. I guess there is some starting pitching to figure out and can always tinker with the pen.
Drat
Kolarek
You misspelled “Kolarek.”
Right. Will change.
It’s apparently a Croatian surname, but perhaps Czech.
With someone else a batter or two behind him I guess.
ALDS NPUT @ 0600 HST, 0900 PDT, 1200 EDT
NLDS NPUT @ 0830 HST, 1130 PDT, 1430 EDT
Yeah! Buehler!
The magic number is now… https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/161b2df115cfaf0505730d3af26ecf939f1b13eddfa386b868197a436295230e.png
I’m starting with 1 exclamation point and moving up. So we have both ends covered.
538 saying Kershaw tomorrow…
I felt that it was imperative that we win tonight’s game.
Me, too!
Not imperative, but odds favor team that wins first game in a five-game series.
I’m hoping this year that the movie (postseason) is as good as the book (regular season). The last 6 years the book has been much better.
I hope it wins an Oscar
Hi ho, hi ho, it’s off to mow I go
Ha!
Three consecutive shutouts.
They can’t win if they don’t score.
You should be doing the colour commentary in the booth!
More like black and white than colour!
Also – you are a kind man to spell color colour for me. (And John)
A sequence?
U are correct
More like black and white than colour!
Also – you are a kind man to spell color colour for me. (And John)
I love I Love LA.
LA Confident-ial
I’m satisfied.
Joe is back!
Dodgers Win!
Woo-HOO !
Smith making some plays back there!
I like Dodgers chances in tonight’s game.
One more.
Last 2 pitches awesome
Just don’t hit Soto in the ribs.
Lux gets his glove wet too
So much for a perfect inning.
So much for the tv crew talking about the Dodgers only giving up one hit.
A well placed routine ground ball though
Apparently the Nats are going to “come back and play tomorrow” according to the tv colour guy.
Who knew?
I know I was surprised when I heard it.
Almost, JT!
Pops
Strickland’s the kind of ex-Gnat we can appreciate.
Joc gonna Joc!
JOC!!!!
Joc dinger!
Joc almost hits one out of the stadium
Joc almost fouls it out of the stadium.
https://twitter.com/jonweisman/status/1147929971177873408?s=20
I sure hope Gavin throws better.
Such a basebally text!
Or a word puzzle.
You can dress him up in a different uniform and put him on the other side of the country, but Hunter Strickland is still Hunter Strickland.
Joc swinging for the fences.
He did a bit of pole dancing as well!
As Vinny would say, Pollock could have mailed his game in.
Pollock not quite there yet.
Not sure what you mean. Not a good game but was OPS+ 130 in the second half.
The game.
Skill
Fiat Lux!
De-LUX!!
Beat ya to it.
Oh my Lux!
Dee- LuX!!!!
Lux-shery
Good summary of how to watch the entire post-season at https://www.truebluela.com/2019/10/3/20897209/tbs-broadcasting-dodgers-vs-nationals-nlds
Unfortunately, even with those options, I still think I’m going to watch on delay.
Nope. Lux!
Good time to have Lux bat for the first time.
A very good time!!
Wow! Nice catch!!
Quite a catch. Hats off.
Beaty on deck.
Beauty.
I spelled it wrong.
Nope. I just used the very Canadian expression – beauty eh?!
Shoulda spelled it L U X.
Ha!
Great to see Parra go down.
Agreed! No baby shark stuff here please.
It’s an amazing experience in Nats Stadium.
Parra’s one of the most loathsome gnon-Gnats in baseball (in fairness, he was a Gnat for a while).
It must have travelled with him from San Fran.
Sweet inning.
Kenta!
Maeda attacking.
Very sharp
Let Maeda finish this one. He can be the 2019 version of the 59 Sherry
Lots of innings left before the WS even begins though.
Would have preferred a RHB after Muncy.
When Seager is your No. 7 hitter, you’ve got a pretty good lineup.
For what it’s worth, Link, the Barves’ starter is Keuchel (as in Reuss), but he doesn’t give it the proper German pronunciation.
Bad day for me. I had the Cardinals’ starter as Mike Mikoas rather than Miles.
I think the Nationals, with their starting pitchers are going to be tough to beat. We will need to pick on their bullpen to have success.
Their bullpen can be shaky but, also, their rotation is out of synch for this series. Strasburg going on short rest, and Scherzer unlikely to pitch more than one game.
Buehler set the tone
Turns out Doc knew what he was doing having him pitch Game 1.
Dodgers stealing bases… and hearts tonight
So much better than breaking them.
Ha!
All that with two outs.
On to the 8th.
Sweet singles tonight.
Small ball…
They’ve been hitting singles since I got out my Foam Finger. Guess I forgot to charge it up fully.
Singles tonight. Doubles tomorrow.
Need one with 4 fingers
And walks
Singles night at Dodgers Stadium as opposed to Whisky-A-Go-Go.
I am not watching any more. Did he hit it to the palm trees?
Singled in two.
No, he singled for two runs.
Max love
Max my man!
When I read that, I was expecting a slam!
Yes!
Yessss
Ball 4. And bases juiced.
Every time Taylor gets on Zach Lee sighs.
And counts his money again
SCORE
Herb?
Rodney is awful, and that’s worse.
Cody… shoulda swung at that one.
Let’s get at least one here Dodgers.
Rodney coming in.
Good to see Verdugo leading the cheer squad
Read where he is unlikely to play in the post-season.
That is unfortunate.
Is indeed, but we have plenty of other options
In business as they say!
Barrels overrated.
Got the walk.
Way outside
Blue!?
Not black.
Joc almost black and blue on that last pitch.
Good thing he read it correctly.
Game Day showed that pitch being in Orange County.
Sadly it looked like he went.
Good, a fastball pitcher.
If he gets on to one, it’s goes the other way even faster
You can say that again. Both the good part and the fast part.
And a righty, so now Joc!
Now Petey and then Kenley (unless we score a bunch of runs!)
Asdrubal Cabrera’s name reminds me of that Cuban player the Dodgers had with the really long last name.
Arruberrena – or something like that?
Yes.
For those scoring at home: Erisbel Arruebarrena
And … his stats. He’s still only 29 years old.
Alphabet?
As I recall, somewhere in the minors he got into a fight with someone on his own team during a mound visit.
Wikipedia: “a poor attitude and various violations of team rules led to his banishment to the low minors and eventual release.”
Time for me to stretch as well
Stretching at home as we enter the home stretch?
Indeed
CT3!
Kenta time.
No nibbling Kenta.
Koala did the job!
3 and done. He is lights out
Imagine if he could get righties out as effectively as well. Oh boy!
Two hard hit outs. 50,000 hearts saw them going out.
Cool night there?
Cooling off quickly.
Kiké in the batter’s circle.
Ump’s calls are all over the place.
I suspect that’s all for Buehler tonight.
Especially with him up at bat third
As sharp as his fastballs have been, his mastery of the off speed stuff has been the most impressive part
Not at first. Much better after Honey talked to him.
A first baseman, Kendricks is not, at least not tonight.
Howie’s an elder but not quite yet a statesman.
Ha! That’s quite good WBB!
One error in 304 chances before tonight.
Thanks for the stat. So, it is just an out-of-character night for him tonight, much to our advantage.
At 1B?
Yep.
WPDave: I’d love to see a photo of father and son wearing those T-shirts….I have been nervously pacing in front of my TV, so I haven’t posted before.
At the game. My stomach…
Maybe tomorrow. Kiddo has gone to bed now. He had a sleepover last night so didnt want 2 late nights in a row.
Understood. And it is closing in on 10 p.m. in Manitoba.
The Ordinals’ situational hitting has suffered from terrible sequencing.
Is that the end of Corbin? Please?
Stretching but not throwing in their bullpen. As far as I can tell.
Surprised they called that an error.
It went right through him. No question whatsoever.
Through the wickets so to speak?
Even though he knelt to block it.
The catcher has time for a snack while waiting for Taylor to get to home.
I won’t second-guess sending Taylor, one of the Dodgers’ fastest players. Eaton made a perfect throw.
Got one more!
Thanks, Howie!
Come on Muncy, let’s get your OPS closer to pi.
Howie has been a sieve tonight.
What the heck on sending CT?!?!
Why was Taylor coming home
A run!
Muncy, the human walking machine, is at it again
I’d take a wild pitch or passed ball
At least he is safe at first
Nice try by Rendon. Crazy good play.
Saved a run.
Sadly true.
Wow Rendon.
Swinging on 3-0. Interesting.
Corbin’s thrown more pitches, but not many more.
Remarkably even.
Why boo on a throw over to first? Don’t know I’ve ever understood that.
I’m happy for the pitcher to wear himself out as much as he likes
Exactly. And a wild throw is probably almost as likely as a pick off.
Venting.
Wills nostalgia?
Nice patience
That’s what Doc said
Wow. Admittedly that was a sweet pitch to Freese.
Borderline.
You misspelled on the black.
Could’ve as easily been called a ball.
Well anything can be called a ball or a strike by any ump so…
And with the same amount of energy
Now can we get about five runs, please?
If only Seager had doubled down the line in the first inning… then we might only need to ask for 3 or 4 runs here!
He has hit two ground balls to the right side and the wrong one went through.
4 strikes to the last hitter
Got him!
Facing bottom of the order helps.
They probably told him if he did not start to throw strikes they were going to make him bunt again.
Ok Walker – finish this inning clean.
That’s more like it.
6 consecutive strikes with help from the batter
Nice breaking ball
3 pitches, now that’s more efficient
A first pitch strike!
Missed. Opportunities. And a very high strike three on Smith.
Drat. I think I’d have let Buehler swing after two strikes.
Risk a double play – or a double.
Needed that foul ball down the line to have been fair.
Not at the first pitch
Well. We lead in both runs, hits and fewer errors.
He felt lucky not to get a slider.
Big at bat here.
Ugly call!
So much for the tight zone.
Walker has been getting that call.
Yeah, good pitch and a hard one to hit.
In retrospect, I’ve seen worse calls.
I thought off the bat a double
Foul!
Do we pinch hit for Buehler here?
Well he is not top three in sacrificing…
Probably not, but you can make a case.
That’s more like it!
One at bat late but not to be thrown back into the lake
An opportunity!
This game is no longer interesting…in a good way.
Now the hit is out of the way, let’s try our first HR
Corey only heard part of what you said!
I’ll allow it
He only heard a fourth of what you said.
With Buehler pitching, the pitch locator on game day looks like a kaleidoscope for each batter.
There we go!
Alright, let’s try something new, like a hit
I understand the Dodgers do get those kinds of thing every so often.
Got him
Thank goodness
Thank Dog!
I wonder if we will go to a long reliever like Stripling next
Activity in the bullpen.
Kenley?
Stand down…
75 pitches and he’s not out of the 4th, and now he’s got the bases loaded. Buehler is not long for this game.
Pitch count, ouch.
So high.
Not close on ball four.
Take your time with him Honeycutt
It worked!
I can just see George Carlin doing a whole bit on being “effectively wild.”
Long inning for Walker.
Nice block
One more, Walker.
This ump is very tight on the zone.
Dp would be timely here
I’ll second that!
Ugh.
Bad future person!
Scoop – don’t know where you are at tonight. Just wanted to let you know that my son and I are wearing 2 very special Dodger t-shirts while watching the game.
Buehler struggling a bit. Uncharacteristic.
Overthrowing a bit maybe?
Just doesn’t look entirely comfortable.
It would be a moral victory if he threw a first pitch strike to someone.
Exactly.
Still waiting.
I did hold my breathe there for a second. I thought it was going to be a Joc special – but not so special in this case.
JT looks rusty.
Doesn’t he always?
I guess it was to be expected. Except I wasn’t expecting it.
Corbin has settled down. Darn it.
Settled down but hopefully not settled in.
Don’t throw your back out Justin
That’s much better
Putting the K in Waler.
The pictures here keep blacking out from time to time, I hope that doesn’t last
What time is it for you?
11.30 In the morning. I should be mowing the lawn, but it will still be there ( and long) in a few hours.
I need to mow my lawn as well but will wait until next week when it is warmer than 5 Celsius.
Early burst of warm weather here at 27 Celsius today
You misspelled 80.6° F.
You misspelled 41° F.
Here as well. We can land humans on the moon…
I might get better reception on the moon
Ha!
Buehler’s control is not at its best.
No, but throwing some serious heat
He has gone back more to his old windup.
Watch your head
Pollock seems to have forgotten his role on the team.
A.J. Had OPS+ 130 in the second half. He is fine.
That’s a good role
E3!
Ordinals win! Change the feed, TNT!
It has on my system.
Me, too.
Buehler needs to throw a few more strikes in inning two.
Coulda shoulda been so much more.
One out away!
Ordinals trying to give it away.
Oh well. We at least got the pitch count up.
And a lead.
Ordinals get the first out.
Free swinging Corey up.
No ocean near by Muncy. How about a palm tree?
Wouldn’t mind him reaching the ocean, however.
I’ll settle for another stroll to first.
There you go!
And then another…
Love to score here, but at least we are getting closer to their pen.
A Brazilian passed ball.
Which should have been called a strike.
No video here until the Ordinals beat the Barves. Walking Billy Hamilton and a dinger by Acuña is not a good start.
Can we please make them pay for walking the lead off batter?
Somehow, Farhan got the Barves to absorb all of Melancon’s horrendous contract.
I’m fine with the Ordinals winning this one, since we see the Dodgers sooner.
Rendon seemed to get a little payback from the ump on that third strike.
Yeah that last pitch seemed like it was just off the corner.
Gameday agrees.
17 pitches, 10 strikes. Turner and Rendon struck out, Eaton grounded out.
Good first for Buehler, even if I can’t see it.
Now I want someone to win, so that TBS switches to Dodgers game.
Trea Turner struck out to start the game.
I’m not yet able to get start of Dodgers’ broadcast.
It’s on TNT, which is two channels up from TBS on my cable system. If the usual pattern follows it’ll switch to TBS once the first game ends.
I have no cable, only Fubotv online. When I click Nats-Dodgers, it sends me back to Atlanta.
I looked. Fubo carries TNT. Don’t know how or if you can switch to it there though.
T-shirt.
Holy smoke what a great throw by Duvall in left.
It was perfect, and it really surprised me – Duvall’s no Gold Glover. Wong’s a pretty fast runner, and the fly ball was up in the air a long time.
Here we go!
It wouldn’t bother me if Melancon blew a save.
And I get my wish. Now let’s see 25 innings.
But then when and where does the Dodger game go? TNT, I guess.
It’s startling that this is still just a 1-0 game. The Braves are 0-5 with RISP.
You misspelled “Barves.”
In gnon-Gnat gnews… https://twitter.com/DodgerBlue1958/status/1179881020000104449?s=20
Meanwhile, in Georgia… https://twitter.com/TheOnion/status/1179872028121276416?s=20
That wouldn’t surprise me at all.
Doc saying that Klayton to throw game 2 so that he might be available to relieve in game 5, if it goes that far.
That means Ryu pitches on the road. I don’t agree with that. He’s 10-1 at home, fer cryin’ out loud!
However… https://twitter.com/Rick_K21/status/1179877211249229824?s=20
Hmm.
It’s a judgement call, but one that I expect went through considerable discussion.
SI examines the urban-suburban divide as exemplified by MLB’s Braves and MLS’s United: two pro franchises, two entirely different fan bases.
Read that SI is cutting 40 staff writers and replacing with 200 freelancers.
That’s no rumor. Apparently this is a pattern of the new ownership.
Time Warner threw the magazine over the side and it got caught by a nasty shark.
For me, the staff writers have always been the allure of SI. As a weekly, writing has to be strong to get people to read about a game they saw last week.
Yeah, and I let my sub lapse a couple of years ago because it was now two weeks behind. I was getting World Series issues Thanksgiving week.
That’s partly my location, I’m sure. Nonetheless, it’s a publishing institution which deserves better than what’s happening to it, and its people are getting the shaft.
Broad-brush article trying to explain the Dodgers’ success assimilating rookies and newly-traded players from the Dodgers’ magazine.