Kershaw glad for big chance
In the Twilight Zone of October, the clock turns back at Dodger Stadium.
To the mound, to the moments that defined World Series champions. Orel Hershiser, steely and standing tall. Fernando Valenzuela, eyes to the sky. The great Sandy Koufax, the picture of pitching.
And that brings us to Game 1 on Tuesday night, when the Los Angeles Dodgers host the Houston Astros. Up on the bump, on baseball’s biggest stage, we finally will see Clayton Kershaw. About time, right? Kershaw has done most everything an ace can accomplish — three Cy Young Awards, five ERA crowns, three strikeout titles, a seven-time all-star who’s also won an MVP trophy and thrown a nohitter.
Now, against a backdrop of the San Gabriel Mountains majestic at sunset, the lefty and his Dodgers make their pitch for the ultimate prize.
“I think that’s the final piece for him,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said.
Said Kershaw: “Who knows how many times I’m going to get to go to the World Series? I know more than anybody how hard it is to get there. So, I’m definitely not taking this one for granted.”
To those Kershaw plays with, he’s got nothing left to prove. A model of consistency, the Dodgers see him as money every time he takes the mound.
It seems almost like an insult, in fact, to suggest anything otherwise.
Yet there is that one nagging set of stats that can’t be overlooked: 6-7 with an unsightly 4.40 ERA in the playoffs.
For the Astros, just four years ago they weren’t bad, they were embarrassing — so embarrassing that many dubbed them the “Lastros.”
Now Houston is heading to its second World Series in franchise history after beating the Yankees in the AL Championship Series, and its time as the league’s laughingstock seems like a distant memory.
“You always picture yourself in the World Series, but to be here after my debut in 2012 with the team that we had, with the players that we had, I never thought we would be here,” left-hander Dallas Keuchel said.
Keuchel is one of just four Astros who remain from a 2013 team that hit rock bottom by losing a franchise-record 111 games in its first year in the AL. Houston became the first team since Kansas City from 2004-06 to lose 100 games in three straight seasons. Those bumbling Astros, who had the league’s lowest payroll as the franchise shed its veterans to rebuild, often played in front of fewer than 10,000 fans and routinely faced boos from the few people who did show up.
All-star second baseman Jose Altuve, super-utility man Marwin Gonzalez and right-hander Brad Peacock are the other holdovers from the lean times.
“When I got here, no one talked about winning,” said manager A.J. Hinch, who took over in 2015. “And that was one of the first things that Altuve told me in my office, that he wanted to win. And that represented what the next step was for this organization. And obviously in 2015 we got to taste it a little bit, 2016 we had some disappointment, 2017 we’re going to the World Series.”