Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Dodgers suddenly can’t find relief
Shocking bullpen blowup prevents a 2-0 series lead
LOS ANGELES — Kenley Jansen is 6-foot-5 and very wide.
The Dodgers closer is undeniably imposing in his home whites on the Dodger Stadium mound even before he throws his cutter, one of the most sadistic and dependable pitches in baseball. That cutter doesn’t always cut, however.
When Marwin Gonzalez’s tying, ninth-inning homer cleared the fence and stunned the Dodger Stadium crowd Wednesday night, Jansen suddenly didn’t look powerful enough to carry his team to a championship on his broad shoulders.
Neither did the Dodgers’ vaunted bullpen, which no longer seems invincible after the Astros’ 7-6, 11-inning victory in Game 2 of the World Series. The relievers’ dominant facade was stomped and shattered, and the stigma from this spectacular meltdown will hover above any close game the rest of this series.
“The ball really carried the whole night,” Jansen said after a game featuring eight homers, the most in World Series history. “You can’t do anything about that.
“One missed pitch. (He) got me.”
Actually, the Dodgers bullpen missed more pitches in Game 2 than it had missed in nine previous postseason games. One of the most successful relief groups in recent baseball history was battered for 11 hits and six earned runs by the Astros, including an astonishing four homers in the final three innings.
And a team that had been 98-0 when leading after eight innings took its first defeat.
Over 30 innings during its first nine playoff games, the Dodgers bullpen had allowed only 12 hits, three earned runs and one homer.
The home run derby that broke out in Chavez Ravine provided one of the most thrilling postseason games in modern times, but it only happened because of mistakes by Ross Stripling, Brandon Morrow, Jansen, Josh Fields and finally Brandon McCarthy, who gave up George Springer’s winning two-run homer in the 11th inning.
A group that barely put a foot wrong all summer and into October suddenly couldn’t keep one foot in front of the other.
“We battled out there,” said Jansen, who had never blown a postseason save and never given up a homer on an 0-2 pitch in his career until Gonzalez connected.
“Every at-bat, nobody was giving up. We still continued to go out there and pitch, and we didn’t come up big this time.”
Since early in their National League Division Series sweep of the Diamondbacks, the Dodgers’ relievers had strung together 28 consecutive scoreless innings. That’s the longest streak in big-league history and a monument to the chemistry of this deep and tested veteran bullpen, put together by a deep-pocketed front office determined to make up for years of postseason relief problems for a team with five straight NL West titles but only this World Series berth.
The Dodgers bullpen led the NL with a 3.38 ERA this season. Left-handers Tony Watson and Tony Cingrani were added at the trade deadline and starter Kenta Maeda became a postseason reliever, building a group that’s deeper and tougher than anything the Dodgers have had in recent years.
“Everybody has so much confidence in everybody else that you’re not worried about giving up the ball,” Morrow said earlier this week. “You know the next guy up will be just as good.”
Manager Dave Roberts has been confident enough in his bullpen to have a quick hook for any starter who encounters even minor trouble.
An aura of inevitability had settled around the Dodgers over the previous three weeks while they won eight of their first nine postseason games. A 104-win team was equally exceptional in the postseason, winning close games and blowouts with equal aplomb while steamrolling into the franchise’s first World Series since 1988.
Through it all the bullpen had been thoroughly dependable — until one incredible game when it wasn’t.
“We’re not frustrated,” Jansen said. “Listen, it isn’t going to be easy. I didn’t make my pitch. You can’t beat yourself up about that.”
Said Roberts: “The bottom line is I’ll take Kenley any day of the week with a one-run lead going into the ninth inning.” RESULTS, SCHEDULE All games at 8 p.m. on FOX Dodgers 3, Astros 1 Astros 7, Dodgers 6 (11) Friday at Astros Saturday at Astros Sunday at Astros Tuesday at Dodgers Wednesday at Dodgers Games 6 and 7 if necessary