The Dodgers needed their bullpen this time, but the result was all the same.
For the third straight game to start the National League Championship Series, the Dodgers held the Brewers to just one run in a 3-1 victory in Game 3. Los Angeles is now one win away from returning to the World Series.
Here are my takeaways:
1. ‘Miz’ silences Dodger Stadium … until the sixth
Sure, it was a 3:08 p.m. PT start on a weekday. But after the Dodgers jumped out for a run in the first inning, a crowd of 51,251 in Los Angeles was mostly out of it for the first five innings.
And that could be attributed to the work of 23-year-old Jacob Misiorowski.
The young All-Star struggled in the second half, registering a 5.36 ERA after the break. But in Game 3 of the NLCS, he looked a lot more like the version who carved through the Dodgers lineup back on July 8, when he struck out a career-high 12 batters and allowed just one run in six innings. It was that performance, in large part, that made him an All-Star.
Three months later, the flamethrower flummoxed the Dodgers’ bats again. Even by his standards, Misiorowski’s stuff was playing up Thursday afternoon. His fastball averaged 101.3 mph — 2 mph faster than his season average — and got up to 102.5. He put out opener Aaron Ashby’s fire in the first inning, leaving two runners stranded when he entered and struck out Tommy Edman and Teoscar Hernandez.
It was a sign of things to come.
Misiorowski struck out nine of the first 16 batters he faced. But before Thursday, he had not gone more than four innings in more than a month. And in his fifth inning of work, things began to unravel.
After a strikeout of Mookie Betts, Will Smith followed with a single. Then Misiorowski walked Freddie Freeman. Brewers manager Pat Murphy stuck with Misiorowski to face switch-hitter Tommy Edman, who delivered an RBI single to put the Dodgers ahead and wake up a slumbering crowd.
2. More Dodgers starting brilliance
The Brewers managed just one baserunner in eight innings of their first game of the series in Milwaukee against Blake Snell. They didn’t do much better in Game 2 against Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who tossed a complete game.
The signs were more promising to start Game 3 in Los Angeles against Tyler Glasnow, but it was still tough sledding for most of the day against another Dodgers starter.
Glasnow stranded two runners in the first before Caleb Durbin tagged him for a triple in the second and scored the tying run with the infield in on a Jake Bauers grounder up the middle. It was the Brewers’ first run since the first pitch of Game 2.
And it was all Glasnow would surrender.
A slick play at third base from Max Muncy, who slid to his left, spun and threw home to get Bauers at the plate, preventing the go-ahead run from scoring. Then Glasnow locked in, reminding everyone why Dodgers pitching coach Mark Prior said before the game that his raw stuff is “top five in baseball.” He struck out the side in the third, then struck out another three in the fourth.
His one run allowed in 5 2/3 innings of work moved the Dodger rotation’s ERA this postseason from 1.54 to … 1.54.
3. Adding injury to insult
Through the first two games of the NLCS, Jackson Chourio was the only Brewers player to knock in a run.
That made the seventh inning feel particularly defeating on Thursday night.
With a runner on second and two outs, Chourio fouled off an 0-2 pitch from Blake Treinen and immediately looked to be in discomfort. Eventually, he hobbled on one foot back to the dugout. It was a brutal blow for a Milwaukee team already struggling to generate offense.
Pinch-hitter Blake Perkins entered for Chourio and struck out to end the threat.
4. Dodgers bullpen stands strong
The Dodgers didn’t need their relievers in a Game 2 win that saw Yamamoto go the distance. This time, the relief corps’ services were required after Glasnow left with two outs in the fifth inning.
And an unstable bullpen delivered.
Treinen’s strikeout after Chourio’s injury eliminated the only real threat the Brewers posed late. Alex Vesia, Treinen, Anthony Banda and new closer Roki Sasaki each struck out a batter and combined to allow just one baserunner over the final 3 1/3 innings.
Blake Treinen looked like his old reliable self in Game 3. (Mary DeCicco/MLB Photos via Getty Images)
4 1/2. Dodgers’ familiarity with opener backfires for Milwaukee
Despite Misiorowski’s success against the Dodgers the last time he saw them, the Brewers elected to start Aaron Ashby as the opener.
Ashby has appeared in all but one game this postseason for the Brewers and threw in each of the first two games of the NLCS, including serving as the opener in Game 1. Over the course of a seven-game series, that familiarity with a pitcher can be a boon for a hitter.
On Thursday, the Dodgers took advantage. Shohei Ohtani, who had an RBI single off Ashby in Game 2, started the bottom of the first with a triple, and Mookie Betts followed with an RBI double. Two batters in, the Dodgers led 1-0.
Later in the night, Abner Uribe also pitched for a third time in the series. The Dodgers didn’t see him well — he retired all four batters he faced after entering for Misiorowski, but a failed pickoff throw to first base with runners at the corners allowed an important insurance run to score.
One of the only positives of the night for the Brewers is that Misiorowski’s performance allowed them to save Jose Quintana, who’s now available for Game 4.
Rowan Kavner is an MLB writer for FOX Sports. He previously covered the L.A. Dodgers, LA Clippers and Dallas Cowboys. An LSU grad, Rowan was born in California, grew up in Texas, then moved back to the West Coast in 2014. Follow him on Twitter at @RowanKavner.
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