World Series Game 3 turning points of an incredible finish

Baserunning Adventures

For a pair of championship teams, some of the baserunning in Friday’s game was curious.

Jackie Bradley singled to lead off the third inning but then tried to steal second while Dodger starter Walked Buehler stood on the mound with the ball. Bradley was out by several feet.

In the bottom of the ninth, with the score tied at 1-each, Cody Bellinger repeated Bradley’s misadventure. David Price picked him off, resulting in a rundown that erased Bellinger.

In the 10th, Ian Kinsler ran for J.D. Martinez, who had walked. Kinsler nearly completed the baserunner’s triple play of infamy. He was almost picked off first, he overslid third and barely beat Justin Turner’s tag, then he was thrown out at home by Bellinger on a baby fly ball to short center.

Eduardo Nunez led off the 15th with a single. Two innings earlier as he stood in the batter’s box, Nunez had been undercut by catcher Austin Barnes, sustaining what appeared to be a minor sprained ankle. It slowed him enough that inning that it prevented him from scoring on Sandy Leon’s two-base hit; instead he was stranded at third. In the 15th, the still-hobbling Nunez took second on a walk, but was thrown out at third on Christian Vazquez’s bunt attempt. Had he scored in the 13th or 15th, Boston would have won.

Eovaldi takes on all

Eovaldi, a likely Game 4 starter when Game 3 began, was pressed into relief duty as the contest wore through the 10th and 11th innings. Entering in the 12th, he matched up against all of the following Dodger pen hands: Ryan Madson, Scott Alexander, Dylan Floro, Kenta Maeda, Julio Urenas and Blake Wood.

To say Eovaldi performed above and beyond the call of duty would be an understatement. Facing 22 Dodger batters, he allowed just three hits, walked only one and struck out five.

He allowed one run in the 13th, but only thanks to a pair of freak happenstances. The first was Nunez falling into the seats while catching a foul pop, permitting Muncy to tag and get into scoring position. The second was Kinsler’s errant throw on Puig’s infield hit, which sent Muncy across.

If Eovaldi was losing anything by the 18th, it related only to command. Muncy’s game-ending homer came on a 98 mph fastball.

Still, it’s now possible that the Red Sox may have seen the last of the man who has become their star reliever in this series. He pitched in all of the first three games, but certainly will be out for Games 4 and 5, and may be problematic if needed for a Game 6. That’s because Eovaldi underwent Tommy John surgery and is only this season showing his post-surgery self. The other salient point is that Eovaldi is a free agent at the end of the Series.

Impatience hurting execution

Perhaps Boston’s best chance to win the game came in the 10th. The inning was highlighted by the best of the Red Sox’ strategic brilliance, and eventually undermined by the visitors’ impatience.

With one out, J.D. Martinez worked Dodger reliever Pedro Baez for a base on balls. As noted earlier, Baez nearly picked off pinch runner Ian Kinsler, but the umpire called Kinsler safe and replays were inconclusive. Seconds later, Holt executed one of the few hit-and-runs  seen in baseball captivity these days, sending Kinsler racing to third with the potential lead run. That brought up Nunez, who needed only a fairly deep fly ball to qualify for hero status.

On a 1-1 pitch, Nunez saw his chance…but the Baez fastball was actually off the plate, and he succeeded only in lifting it into medium center, where Bellinger gathered under it and dared Kinsler to try to score on him. Kinsler took the bait and was thrown out by five feet.

Had Nunez waited for a better pitch, the outcome might have been different. Likewise, had Kinsler waited at third, it would have given Bradley a chance to drive him in.

The double play somewhat balanced Bellinger’s scales, since it was he who – in the bottom of the 9th – had singled, then been picked off first by Price and retired in a rundown.

Bullpen roulette

As is inevitable in an 18-inning game, both Roberts and Cora faced reliever decisions that could have been argued either way.

Start with Roberts’ decision to lift Buehler after seven innings. On the one hand, he’s a young pitcher with a great future nobody wants to abuse, he had thrown nearly 100 pitches,  the Dodgers led (if only by a run) and closer Jansen was fresh and ready in the bullpen.

On the other hand, the Red Sox appeared clueless against Buehler all night, and the Dodgers were down 2 games to none, making this a game they HAD to win. Roberts went to Jansen, who gave up a game-tying home run to Bradley. But, the Dodgers eventually did win.

How about Cora’s decision to remove Joe Kelly after the sixth inning in favor of Ryan Brasier. Kelly, Cora’s third of an eventual nine pitchers, had pitched a strong sixth, but the decision to lift him was Standard Operating Procedure for most managers, who dislike burning relievers for more than a single inning unless absolutely necessary because it limits their next-day options.

So Kelly will be available Saturday, as will Brasier, Matt Barnes and Heath Hembree, who also pitched just one inning. But had Kelly – or any of them — pitched a second inning, it’s possible that Cora would have been less strapped when forced to let Eovaldi work more than six full innings of the marathon.

No chances

The striking aspect of Friday’s game was how much in command the pitchers were. Together, the Dodgers and Red Sox batted just .146, and if they weren’t hitting the ball out of the park they weren’t hitting the ball anywhere meaningful.

Aside from Bradley’s home run, the Red Sox advanced only five runners all night to second base, only one of whom scored. Boston was 3-for-15 with a runner on base, including Betts 0-4 and Bogaerts 0-2.

Not that the Dodgers were better. Aside from their two home runs, the home team moved only four runners to second base in 18 innings, and managed just a single hit in 19 attempts with one or more runners on base. (That lone hit, Puig’s infield single in the 13th, produced the game-tying run.)

In a game so bereft of scoring opportunities, microscopic things can sometimes take on importance outside the appearances of the moment. One of those microscopic things took place in the Boston eighth, and while there is no way to tell whether it impacted the outcome, it might have.

The first batter Jansen faced in relief of Buehler was Brock Holt. He took three pitches, two balls and a strike, then looked over Jansen’s fourth pitch, a high cutter. That’s what Holt and Statcast thought, anyway. But plate umpire Ted Barrett ruled it strike 2.

For the average major league hitter, the difference between a 2-2 count and a 3-1 count is the difference between a .183 batting average and a .363 batting average. For Holt personally in 2018, it was the difference between .185 and .429. … In other words, Barrett’s miscall was a –potentially big deal.

Of course, we’ll never know what Holt might have done in a 3-1 count. We do know that in that 2-2 count he flew harmlessly to left. We also know that two batters later Bradley hit his game-tying home run.  So it’s possible – by no means certain but possible – that had Ted Barrett not missed the call on Janssen’s 2-1 pitch, Bradley’s homer might have provided Boston’s winning margin.

The World Series picks back up again Saturday night in Los Angeles with two groggy teams as both teams currently list their starter as “to be determined” for the game. The Dodgers will most likely send Rich Hill to the mound, while the Red Sox may go with Eduardo Rodriguez.