2020 MLB Playoffs: Padres and Dodgers face serious pitching questions

The Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres have question marks surrounding their top pitchers as the MLB playoffs advance to the Divisional Series.

The Wild Card Round of the 2020 MLB playoffs provided us with more playoff baseball than ever before, elite pitching performances, epic bat flips, and set us up for an even better round of playoff baseball in this week’s Divisional Series.

Pairing Houston vs. Oakland, New York vs. Tampa Bay, and Miami vs. Atlanta is sure to provide plenty of drama-filled, high-quality baseball, but it’s the looming San Diego Padres vs. Los Angeles Dodgers series which may provide the most fireworks, stare-downs, bat flips, and heated exchanges.

A best-of-five-series isn’t going to be enough between these two franchises.

However, both of these teams may be happy that this isn’t a seven-game series. Entering Tuesday’s series-opening contest, the Dodgers and Padres are both facing serious questions about some of their top starting pitchers.

With no days off in the series, pitching will be crucial to a team’s success. Which of these teams can survive a five-game series?

For the Los Angeles Dodgers, the big question surrounds Game 1 starter, Walker Buehler. Faced with a blister issue that has severely limited his innings in 2020, Buehler’s ability to work a deep and effective outing in Game 1 will be key.

Overall, Buehler made eight starts in the regular season, going 1-0 with a 3.44 ERA and 42 strikeouts in 36.2 innings. But he pitched just four innings over the final three weeks of the regular season and four innings in his Wild Card start against Milwaukee.

Buehler showed just how dominant he is, despite the limited action this year, last week by striking out eight Milwaukee hitters. If blisters force him to exit the contest early, LA will have to rely on their bullpen very early on and if the Padres lineup is clicking, it’s going to make for an extremely long series.

Buehler made one start against San Diego this season, giving up three home runs and walking three in five innings.

Will the San Diego Padres have their top two starting pitchers for the NLDS as they look to advance in the 2020 MLB playoffs?

For San Diego, the questions are much more noteworthy. They were able to slam their way past St. Louis behind a bullpen game in Game 3 that saw San Diego use nine pitchers. That won’t work against one of the league’s top offenses in LA.

Reports have been all over the place about Mike Clevinger, but MLB Network’s Jon Morosi recently reported that Clevinger threw a “high-intensity” bullpen session in Texas and may be ready to throw for San Diego. Clevinger has pitched just one inning since throwing seven shutout innings against San Francisco on Sept. 13.

Manager Jayce Tingler isn’t expected to announce his Game 1 starter until Tuesday morning.

This is the exact situation for which AJ Preller traded for Mike Clevinger, to limit a high-powered offense like the Dodgers and put his team in a position to make a serious World Series run. Even if San Diego can get one start from Clevinger in this series, it’s a huge boost for one of the league’s top bullpens.

The news surrounding Dinelson Lamet, San Diego’s top pitcher throughout the regular season, isn’t as promising. Left off the Wild Card series roster due to an elbow injury, Lamet has yet to reportedly throw a bullpen session and is still considered day-to-day. If Lamet is not healthy enough to make a start, he won’t find himself on the NLDS roster either.

Both Chris Paddack and Zach Davies are coming off rough playoff outings. Having Lamet and Clevinger in the rotation would provide a huge boost to San Diego’s chances to get past Los Angeles, but if neither can go, odds sway heavily in favor of the Dodgers.

The 2020 MLB playoffs continue on Monday with two ALDS matchups, followed by all four series in action on Tuesday. The San Diego Padres and Los Angeles Dodgers square off in Game 1 at 9:30 p.m. ET.