‘Disappointed’ Dodgers eliminated early again
Suddenness has become common, but it hasn’t gotten easier. As the Arizona Diamondbacks’ raucous celebration moved from their clubhouse to the pool at Chase Field and back again Wednesday night, the Los Angeles Dodgers walked quietly and solemnly through the visiting clubhouse, another exhilarating summer spilling in a discouraging autumn. , an all-too-familiar outcome for an otherwise triumphant franchise.
This time it was a young, scrappy, confident Arizona team that manhandled its starting pitchers, stifled its best hitters and rarely let the 100-win Dodgers take a breath.
“They kept hitting us in the face and we couldn’t get up,” Los Angeles utility man Enrique Hernandez said after a season-ending 4-2 loss in Game 3 of this National League Division Series. “There aren’t many words other than pain, disappointment, frustration. We’re a little embarrassed.”
The D-backs, 16 wins worse than the Dodgers during the regular season, scored six runs in the first inning against Clayton Kershaw in Game 1 and three runs in the first inning against Bobby Miller in Game 2. In Game 3, Arizona took a 4-0 lead with four home runs in the third inning against Lance Lynn, the major league leader in home runs allowed, and didn’t need much more.
The Dodgers became just the second team in baseball history to win 100 games during the regular season and didn’t even have a lead during the subsequent postseason series, joining the 1963 New York Yankees, who were swept in the Series. World Cup by the Dodgers of another era. . It was the third year in a row that the Dodgers were eliminated in the postseason by a team that finished more than 15 games better than them in the regular season. In each of the last two years, they were defeated in the Division Series by a division rival they previously dominated: first by the San Diego Padres and then by Arizona, both after relatively long byees.
“There are some things with the format that people can analyze or whatever, but the bottom line is the last two years we’ve been outplayed in the postseason,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “It doesn’t matter if it was a seven-game series; we lost the first three games. For me, I have to do a better job of finding a way to prepare our guys for the postseason. I accept that. I think we have great players. I have to find a way to prepare these guys for any format, any series.
“Yes, in the regular season, I think we did a great job. But in the last playoffs we just didn’t do well, so I have to figure it out.”
The Dodgers won more than 100 games in 2019, 2021, 2022 and 2023 and were eliminated in their first playoff series in three of those years, with the only exception being a 2021 season that ended at the hands of the eventual champion Atlanta Braves in the National League Championship Series. These past 10 years have seen them put together one of the most successful regular-season stretches in baseball history, but it has resulted in just one championship, achieved during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.
This year, the Dodgers came into the postseason with their starting pitchers as committed as ever, and it showed more clearly than they could have imagined. Kershaw, Miller and Lynn combined to pitch just 4⅔ innings, the fewest in the first three games of a postseason round. They allowed 13 runs, 16 hits and three walks during that stretch, constantly putting their offense in an uphill battle.
“Obviously, it’s a horrible way to end this, personally, but that’s ultimately not important. It’s just that I didn’t help the team win this series,” said Kershaw, who will enter another offseason not knowing if he will retire. “That’s the most important thing: letting guys down, stuff like that. Process them as best you can. I don’t know what that means, but yeah, go from there.”
The Dodgers bullpen gave his offense a chance in Game 3, just as he did in Game 2. But the lineup once again struggled to produce timely hits. It was most evident in the eighth, down two runs, after pinch-hitter Kolten Wong drew a walk to lead off the order. Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman struck out, and JD Martinez, who moved up for game three, flied out harmlessly.
Betts and Freeman put together MVP-caliber campaigns and fueled the Dodgers’ high-powered offense all season, but they went a combined 21-1 record when it mattered most.
“We didn’t do well,” Freeman said.
“I can’t speak for all of us,” Betts added, “but I’m sure I did absolutely nothing to help us win.”
Los Angeles beat the D-backs in each of the final five regular-season games, outscoring them by 18 runs in the process, then scored just two runs in each of the three NL Division Series games against they. Zac Gallen and Merrill Kelly, Arizona’s two best starting pitchers by a wide margin, had a 5.93 ERA in six starts against the Dodgers during the regular season and then combined to allow just two runs in 11⅔ innings in Games 1 and 2. In Game 3, it was rookie right-hander Brandon Pfaadt who recorded the first 13 scoreless outs, handing the game to the D-backs’ high-leverage relievers.
A quartet of solo home runs in the third inning, by Geraldo Perdomo, Ketel Marte, Christian Walker and Gabriel Moreno, provided all the support Arizona needed. They traveled a combined total of 1,626 feet, all within a six-hitter stretch. The third-farthest ball of the night, however, came courtesy of Los Angeles’ Chris Taylor, with one on and one out in the ninth inning and the Dodgers still trailing by two. He went 383 feet and could have tied the game. But he was hit toward the deep end of the ballpark and instead settled into the glove of center fielder Alek Thomas.
Another cruel outcome that led to another abrupt end.
“We just didn’t play well,” Taylor said. “I don’t think there is a magic answer.”
