| Christopher Reina. 14th October, 2009 - 6:42 pm
 For the second consecutive season, the Dodgers and Phillies will meet in the LCS. Two teams haven't met in the LCS in consecutive seasons since the legendary Yankees/Red Sox battles of 2003 and 2004.
With the homefield advantage, the Dodgers are slight favorites with oddsmakers and the three following areas will determine whether the franchise will make its first World Series appearance since 1988.
1. Starting Pitching
This is not your father's Dodgers' pitching staff of Koufax and Drysdale. It isn't even your older brother's pitching staff of Hershiser and Belcher. This is a ragtag group that must overachieve.
Philadelphia has vastly superior pitching and the Dodgers cannot realistically expect to give up just six earned runs in 27 innings like they did against the Cardinals. Vicente Padilla pitched seven scoreless innings in St. Louis and will likely pitch in the familiar confines of Philadelphia, but a repeat performance is unlikely. Padilla has a 4.98 career ERA in 26 career starts at Citizen's Bank Park and he's never had to face the Phillies' lineup while pitching there before.
Clayton Kershaw was the Dodgers' most consistent starter and will pitch Game 1. He gave up two earned runs on nine hits over 6.2 innings in Game 2 against St. Louis. Kershaw came into that start with previous success against the Cardinals, but the opposite is the case with Philadelphia. In 20.1 career innings, Kershaw has a 6.64 ERA against the Phillies, easily his worst mark against any team he has at least 10 innings of work against.
Like Padilla, Randy Wolf is a former member of the Phillies. He has a career 4.42 ERA against his former team in 18.1 innings and a 4.30 career at at Citizen's Bank Park.
2. Hitting Lefties
The Dodgers only had six NLDS at bats against lefty pitching; in the the NLCS they will have dozens as they battle Cliff Lee, Cole Hamels and J.A. Happ.
Over the course of the 2009 season, the Dodgers posted a .786 OPS against lefties, which was good for a solid eighth in the MLB. Matt Kemp and Casey Blake each had OPS totals over 1.000, while Manny Ramirez and Ronnie Belliard were firmly in the .800 against southpaws.
The question will be how Andre Ethier produces for the Dodgers. He has been a huge part of the Dodgers' success offensively, but he hit just .629 against lefties this season. He has a .300 OPS in 10 at bats against Hamels, an 0-for-3 mark against Lee and has never faced Happ.
3. Previous NLCS History
Phiadelphia of course won last year's NLCS 4-1, with the bullpen being an unquestioned strength. Brad Lidge, Ryan Madson, J.C. Romero and Scott Eyre all escaped multiple trips to the mound without giving up an earned run.
Chad Billingsley was a complete disaster in his starts in Game 1 and 5 (10 earned runs in five innings), and following his 2009 meltdown he has been relegated to mop-up relief work, so he won't be a negative factor this year.
In the bullpen, the Dodgers were far from bad, but performed below their regular season numbers. The Dodgers need lights out performances from Jonathan Broxton and newcomer George Sherril, along with reliable innings from Jeff Weaver, Hong-Chih Kuo and Ronald Belisario.
There are a lot of changes in the Dodgers' lineup, most notably the new Manny. He had a 1.748 OPS and seven of the team's 25 RBIs in last year's NLCS and though he is hitting much better of late, he is a shadow of his 2008 self. Nomar Garciaparra had a highly productive seven at bats and is gone to Oakland, while Jeff Kent was a miserable 0-for-8 and is now retired. Loney and Kemp produced well, but Joe Torre got next to nothing out of Ethier.
Ethier has been the Dodgers' most valuable run producer this season and how he overcomes the Phillies' lefties this season will largely determine how many runs the pitching staff has to work with. |
