Former Dodger giving his old team a run for their money
Boston’s Nathan Eovaldi is wearing out LA in the World Series
The Dodgers’ former scouting director is talking about one of his favorite draft picks, and it’s not long before he draws what seems at first like an extreme comparison.
“I always used to tell him, ‘You’re gonna be the hardest throwing pitcher out of Alvin, Texas,’ ” Logan White said.
Nathan Eovaldi always balked at the notion, White said. Eovaldi’s hometown, which is about 30 miles south of Houston, was famous for one thing: being the childhood home of Hall of Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan. But White hasn’t been wrong. Eovaldi, a right-hander the Boston Red Sox have used out of the bullpen in the first two games of the World Series, has already thrown harder than what was recorded as Ryan’s fastest pitch, 100.9 mph in 1974, then a record. Eovaldi has touched 102 mph five times since the start of 2015, according to MLB’S Statcast system.
Velocity is one reason why Eovaldi has become one of the most dominant pitchers of this postseason. He’s reached triple digits in both games against the Dodgers, the team that drafted him in 2008 and traded him to the Miami Marlins for Hanley Ramirez four years later.
And there’s no relief for his former team in sight. Red Sox manager Alex Cora has tentatively named Eovaldi his starting pitcher for Game 4 at Dodger Stadium Boston Red Sox pitcher Nathan Eovaldi throws against the Chicago White Sox at Guaranteed Rate Field in Chicago on Aug. 31. The one-time Los Angeles Dodgers fireballer is bedeviling his former team in the 2018 World Series.
on Saturday. However, that plan could change if there’s another opportunity for Eovaldi to be Boston’s setup man for a third straight game on Friday.
“If we have a chance to be up 3-0 with him on the mound and Craig
[Kimbrel], we’ll do it,” Cora said.
Set back by a laundry list of injuries, Eovaldi this year pitched in the major leagues for the first time since undergoing a second elbow ligament replacement surgery in late 2016.