HOLLYWOOD’S BASEBALL ACES
Kershaw, Greinke give Dodgers hope for postseason
Alex Wood first heard reports he might be traded when the lefthanded pitcher was riding the Atlanta Braves bus from Baltimore to Philadelphia on July 29 for the final series of a 10-game trip. The news was confirmed the next day: As he rode to Citizens Bank Park, he learned he had been dealt to the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Wood returned to the hotel, packed, flew to Atlanta, repacked and flew to Los Angeles to join his new teammates before flying across the country again, just to make his Dodgers debut back in Philadelphia on Aug. 4.
At least those first two games in the Dodgers dugout afforded the 24-year-old a close view of starts made by Cy Young winners Zack Greinke and Clayton Kershaw, who are two of the top contenders for this year’s award in the National League, too.
“I think there’s probably lots I can learn from a lot of these guys,” Wood said. “Two of the best pitchers on the planet — it’s going to be fun to be around, you know?”
The Dodgers were leading the NL West by three games going into Monday, in no small part because Greinke and Kershaw make 40% of their starts. Last month, both extended scoreless streaks to at least 37 innings, and they were the NL’s 1-2 in ERA for the month, each checking in under 1.00; Kershaw’s 0.27 was the second-best July mark since 1941.
After seeing such performances in action, here were Wood’s initial scouting reports:
On Kershaw: “The first thing that stands out is the competitiveness. He’s up there in a class of his own in terms of that and how he attacks hitters.”
On Greinke: “He’s just a surgeon out there. He’s so good at picking apart hitters and the way he pitches to them.”
The same three-team trade that brought Wood to Los Angeles also landed Miami Marlins starter Mat Latos. The two extend a rotation that had been lacking in depth in order to help the Dodgers reach the postseason, but there’s a good chance one of those two wouldn’t even make a start in the playoffs, especially considering No. 3 starter Brett Anderson is quietly having a good year, too.
For the Dodgers to advance in October and win their first World Series title since 1988, the onus will fall on Kershaw and Greinke.
The 2001 Arizona Diamondbacks’ Curt Schilling and Randy Johnson are the best example of such a 1-2 punch. They were 9-1 in 12 appearances (11 starts) with five complete games, three shutouts and 103 strikeouts in 892⁄ innings with a 1.30 ERA while throwing 58% of Arizona’s postseason innings.
Such a run this fall might be imperative, as there is a chance it could be their final season together. Greinke’s contract allows him to opt out at year’s end, a move that likely would enable him to get a pay raise on the open market. The pair of aces are already scheduled to exceed $60 million in joint earnings next year.
Greinke and Kershaw are two of three NL pitchers (along with the Washington Nationals’ Max Scherzer) averaging seven innings a start, getting deep into games by mixing great stuff with a masterful approach.
“Zack and Clayton are two phenomenal game managers,” Dodgers catcher A.J. Ellis said. “They know exactly what each atbat, each situation calls for.”
Greinke is having the better individual season, with major league bests in ERA (1.71), walks plus hits per inning pitched (0.85) and win-loss percentage (11-2, .846).
“I think the approach is the same,” Kershaw said of Greinke. “His stuff is pretty much the same. It’s that he’s just better.”
After Greinke prevailed Thursday despite his worst start in four seasons, manager Don Mattingly said, “I don’t worry about his confidence too much. He’s been getting pretty much everybody out.”
Meantime, Kershaw outdid Cy Young himself. Kershaw made three starts in a row in which he had at least 10 strikeouts and zero walks, becoming the first modern-era pitcher to do so and the first to have such back-to-back outings since Young in 1905.
Kershaw has a 2.51 ERA this season and ranks first in the majors in strikeouts (197). Both aces continue to evolve. Greinke, for instance, has mastered his changeup, which Ellis now calls “probably one of the more dominant pitches in all of baseball.” Beginning during his 2009 American League Cy Young season, Greinke threw his changeup about 10% of the time through last year; in 2015 that has risen to 22% and hitters are missing on 36% of their swings at the pitch, according to Pitch F/X data at BrooksBaseball.net.
Kershaw, meanwhile, is learning to adapt to the way batters approach him. He said he knows opposing hitters have a high firstpitch swing rate against him — 40%, compared with a league average of 29%. His 37-inning scoreless streak ended Friday when the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Gregory Polanco homered on his first pitch.
“I’ll give up some hits early, but at the same time I’ll get ahead a lot too. Anytime you get ahead 0-1, you’ve got a better chance to get guys to swing and miss on offspeed stuff and things like that,” Kershaw said.
Perhaps because he’s usually pitching ahead in the count, he’s inducing favorable contact — his ground-ball rate has risen to 54%, up from a career norm of 47%. Ellis, who has caught two-thirds of Kershaw’s starts, called the young lefty “very committed to being 0-1 on everybody he faces” and praised Kershaw’s improved slider as a pair to his already devastating curve.
“The consistency of his breaking balls has taken him to another level,” Ellis said.
And, the Dodgers hope, their aces will take them to another level this fall.