2024-10-12 23:00:03
We all know that the Mets-Dodgers National League Championship Series is going to be portrayed as something of a David vs. Goliath, given the very different expectations of these clubs entering the 2024 season. But that might not be quite accurate. For one thing, for all the talk about the Dodgers spending a billion dollars last winter, it’s actually the Mets who are the higher payroll team here. For another, remember that since the middle of May — or, you know, five full months — the teams have had almost exactly identical winning percentages.
And, also, it’s New York vs. Los Angeles. Is it even possible for there to be a “David” here? (No, not Roberts.)
What we have, instead, is Ohtani vs. Lindor. We have the battle over Mike Piazza’s legacy. We have what’s a far more compelling baseball series than you might have thought had you learned about this a few months ago. Let’s go position by position to break it down.
Will Smith and Francisco Alvarez both produced excellent first halves, then had really difficult second halves — and neither has done much of anything at all in the postseason, save for Smith’s long Game 4 home run. Smith earns a small edge here, just because he’s been better over the course of the last two seasons — i.e., the length of Alvarez’s career — but it’s not by much. Though both have been ice cold, each have proven they can be much, much better than this.
Freddie Freeman is a living Hall of Famer, and while Pete Alonso is, of course, very good, he is likely not quite that. (If you rate all of their seasons by WAR, Freeman has the top five and 10 of the top 11.) That’s obviously partially about Freeman being a star before Alonso even reached the bigs. But it’s not just about past history; even just in 2024, Freeman was still the better player. Usually, that would be enough for an edge here, yet this isn’t a usual situation. Freeman’s badly injured ankle forced him out of Game 2 early, prevented him from playing in Game 4 at all, and caused him to be lifted for defense in Game 5.
He’s clearly not at full strength. And while he’s earned a great deal of respect for trying to play through it, we’ll have to take a fully functional and hot Alonso over a diminished Freeman.
This might not go how you think it will — because while Jose Iglesias (137 OPS+) was indeed much better than Gavin Lux (101 OPS+), there have always been a lot of questions about how long Iglesias could make that last, given A) an entire career of not doing that, and B) his presence as what Statcast considers the second-largest overperformer in baseball. That’s already happened, to some extent, as Iglesias is hitting merely .207/.233/.207 in the postseason. It’s gone the other way for Lux, who was just fantastic in the second half (.304/.391/.508, an .899 OPS) after purposefully adding some aggression to his swing, before pitching in with a homer in NLDS Game 4.
It’s enough to not worry that much about the full-season stat line, and focus on who these guys are right now. That said, the Mets also have a wild card: the possibility of Jeff McNeil returning from a fractured wrist to be available in some capacity, because after his own midseason change to be more aggressive, he slugged .533 in his last 50 games. It’s hard to know, however, what he may be ready to offer.
It’s has-a-strong-case-to-be-MVP-and-has-had-some-legendary-moments Francisco Lindor against … well, it’s hard to say. It’s not Mookie Betts; he’s in right field. It might be Miguel Rojas, if he’s healthy, or Tommy Edman, if he’s not, and probably it ends up being both of them, and it really doesn’t matter, does it? The Mets have Lindor. The Dodgers do not.
Now, we start really getting into all the moving parts the Dodgers have, because this is going to be Max Muncy — unless he has to shift to first if Freeman needs relief, in which case it would be Chris Taylor or Enrique Hernández. Muncy and New York’s Mark Vientos hit roughly evenly during the regular season, though of course Muncy has a much longer track record of doing so. But Vientos has been much better this postseason. And while that alone isn’t enough for an edge here, the fact that Taylor and Hernández are each sizable steps down — and the likelihood that one of them is needed here — tilts this to the Mets.
Over the course of their respective careers, which each began in 2016, Brandon Nimmo has been a fair bit more valuable than Teoscar Hernández — even if Nimmo remains a criminally underrated star. But Nimmo’s solid first half (.815 OPS) collapsed into a summer-long struggle (.595 OPS) in the second half, though he’s rebounded in the postseason. Meanwhile, Hernandez had something like a career year, mashing 33 homers, and ended up out-slugging Nimmo by 102 points. He’s been just as good in October, too. This one goes to Los Angeles.
Mickey, Willie, and/or the Duke, this is not. Far from the days where center field would be the home of a team’s biggest stars, this series features a collection of useful — if imperfect — role players, with a somewhat unclear vision of who exactly gets the most playing time here. The Dodgers have primarily used Edman, except he might be needed at shortstop, or they could use Enrique Hernández, except he might be needed at third base, and they might just end up with the talented-yet-inconsistent Andy Pages. (Neither James Outman nor Kevin Kiermaier was on the NLDS roster.)
It’s a lot. The Mets counter with Harrison Bader and/or Tyrone Taylor, who have not hit even a little in the postseason. But at least we know that whichever one it is, they’ll provide strong defense. We’re considering bending the rules to give each side a disadvantage, but all it takes is one great fielding play to turn the tide in a short series.
Remember that brief moment at the beginning of the Padres series, when the only question about Betts was why his postseason struggles had lingered? A few big homers later, and all of a sudden he was one of the best hitters the Dodgers had in the NLDS. He’s also still “literally Mookie Betts.” At 35 years old, Starling Marte has missed a great deal of time the last two years with injuries, and hasn’t stood out when available (89 OPS+); his once-excellent defense is now a liability. This is an easy one.
The Dodgers employ Shohei Ohtani.
No disrespect at all intended to J.D. Martinez, of course, who was an All-Star for the Dodgers last season before moving on to the Mets. But he’s not Ohtani. No one is.
We could evaluate these two simply on the merits of the pitchers who are likely to make starts, but it’s more complicated than that. Since the Mets dispatched the Phillies in four games, they’ll have had three days off to reset their rotation, allowing manager Carlos Mendoza to choose between any of Kodai Senga, Luis Severino, and Sean Manaea (the Mets are going with Senga in Game 1, with Manaea in Game 2). Those are the top three, with Jose Quintana likely to start Game 4, and Senga, Manaea and Severino available again to start potential Games 5, 6, and 7.
It’s a good rotation, not a great one. But it is, at least, a rotation. It’s four average-to-solid starters who can handle all seven games, if needed. Meanwhile, the Dodgers only had three starters to begin with — and each of Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Jack Flaherty, and Walker Buehler come with considerable questions — and now, with Yamamoto having been used in NLDS Game 5, he’s unavailable until at least NLCS Game 3 — and more likely Game 4 — possibly giving him just a single NLCS start.
That means, if the series goes seven, they’ll need four starts from Flaherty and Buehler — along with potentially two bullpen games. The Dodger bullpen is pretty good, so maybe that’s not a terrible option. It’s not, however, a rotation.
It’s been a bit of a whiplash-like season for the Dodger relievers — note the 2.57 ERA in May/June disintegrating into a 5.65 mark in July — but it stabilized near the end of the season, and has been an absolute strength in October. It’s even better than it looks, really; of the six earned runs the bullpen has allowed, half came off of low-leverage rookie Edgardo Henriquez mopping up in San Diego’s Game 2 blowout win. Surely you saw the Padres fail to score for 24 consecutive innings to end the NLDS?
Blake Treinen, Anthony Banda, Michael Kopech, Alex Vesia, Evan Phillips, and Daniel Hudson have each pitched multiple scoreless innings in the playoffs so far, and that group of six had already posted 302 1/3 innings of 2.53 ERA ball for Los Angeles in the regular season. (Though Vesia leaving Game 5 with an injury adds some concern.)
It’s a strong group, perhaps stronger than the Dodgers have had in some time, and they’re going to be relied upon heavily in the NLCS. It’s not that the Mets ‘pen is a weakness, of course; when Edwin Díaz is at his best, there’s hardly anyone better, and Tylor Megill and David Peterson have become valuable multi-inning pieces. But a key issue here is that the Mets relievers had the highest walk rate in the NL this year (10.8%), and they’ve actually walked more in the postseason (12.4%). Look no further than the end of the Phillies series to see just what kind of tightrope a postseason bullpen must walk when they’re handing out free passes.
We’re not necessarily out here on the vibes train, because as impressive as the OMG and Grimace runs have been, ultimately these are baseball teams who need to win baseball games. But the Mets haven’t been a Johnny-come-lately flash, either. As we said, go back all the way to May 15 — nearly five months ago — and they won more regular-season games than the Dodgers. It’s not as much a mismatch as the narratives are going to make it seem.
Throw in their ability to set their rotation while the Dodgers have to scramble yet again, and prepare to see a whole lot more of a certain purple fast-food mascot.
