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The Mets are the first team to advance to the Championship Series round. The Tigers and Yankees could join as early as tonight, and the Dodgers and Padres are taking it to the brink. I’m Levi Weaver, here with Ken Rosenthal. Welcome to The Windup!
NLDS Updates: Mets advance, Dodgers survive
Mets 4, Phillies 1: The New York Mets — The Mets! — are going to the NLCS. The Phillies, meanwhile, get to spend another winter trying to figure out what went wrong in October, as they lost yet another series to a team they were favored to beat.
Remember a week and a half ago? That was when the Mets had to fly to Atlanta for one day, and win at least one game in a doubleheader with the Braves to even make the playoffs. Since then: Brewers down. Phillies down. The Mets are alive and well.
Equally as impressive? So are their fans, despite a rash of heart-stopping comebacks and close games. Game 4 was the latest to follow the trend, as the Mets entered the sixth trailing the Phillies 1-0. Shield your eyes, Phillies fans …
FRANCISCO LINDOR. GRAND SLAM. #NLDS pic.twitter.com/CdKuEVOfT3
— MLB (@MLB) October 9, 2024
It was a grand slam, and that was all the Mets would need to take this traveling circus to the next city. Which city? Well …
Dodgers 8, Padres 0: No Freddie Freeman. No Miguel Rojas, no starting pitcher? No problem. The Dodgers evened up the series with a huge win in San Diego.
The game started with Mookie Betts — for the third time in three games — hitting a ball over the wall in the first inning. This one, like the second, evaded all gloves for a home run. The game only got more lopsided from there.
After big wins in the last two games, the Padres had all the momentum coming into Game 4, where a win would have vaulted them into the NLCS. Not that Dylan Cease was particularly impressive in Game 1, but his regular-season performance would have suggested the Padres had the advantage over a Dodgers “bullpen game.”
But Cease lasted just 1 2/3 innings, allowing three runs on four hits. It never got any closer. By the time it was over, the Dodgers’ side of the box score featured as many relief pitchers (eight) as runs, and the series was headed back to Los Angeles for a winner-take-all Game 5 on Friday.
Ken’s Notebook: Mookie Betts, just in time
From my latest column:
SAN DIEGO – First theory: Mookie Betts was done in by bad habits. That’s how Los Angeles Dodgers hitting coach Robert Van Scoyoc saw it. Betts was experimenting toward the end of the regular season, as he is wont to do, and certain troublesome patterns formed. What were his bad habits?
“That’s what I was trying to figure out,” said Betts, who hit a first-inning homer Wednesday night to spark the Dodgers’ 8-0 victory and help force a winner-take-all Game 5 of their Division Series against the San Diego Padres.
“Everything was fine all season. In June” — before Betts fractured his left hand and spent nearly two months on the injured list — “everything was fine. Then all of a sudden postseason comes …
Betts was getting hit in the mouth, all right. In the first two games of this series he went 0-for-6, extending his postseason slump to 0-for-22 and 3-for-44. His teammate, Kiké Hernández, contends one postseason does not bleed into another. Yet it was sure looking way until Betts changed the discussion in Games 3 and 4, going 4-for-9 with two homers.
For a slumping hitter, nothing comes easy. Betts experienced almost a comical form of hitting anguish, depositing balls over the left-field wall in three consecutive games, but nearly ending up with only one home run.
“The first one, that was in the midst of the 0-for-whatever, so that was really deflating,” Betts told the MLB on Fox post-game crew. “And then (Tuesday) I got to see one fall. I felt kind of like Steph Curry a little bit. I just needed to see one go in and then I knew I could do it.”
More here.
ALDS Updates: Tigers, Yankees take 2-1 leads
Tigers 3, Guardians 0: After allowing five runs in the first inning of Game 1, Detroit pitchers have allowed just two runs in the subsequent 26 innings, including an ongoing streak of 20 scoreless innings. With yesterday’s win, they’re now one away from the ALCS.
In Game 2, Detroit had the benefit of leaning on starter Tarik Skubal to keep Cleveland’s offense in check. Yesterday, it was back to the same strategy that served the Tigers so well in their second-half surge: “pitching chaos.”
It was so chaotic, in fact, that Guardians manager Stephen Vogt pinch hit for right fielder Will Brennan in the second inning — before Brennan even took a plate appearance. In the third, it was David Fry pinch-hitting for Kyle Manzardo.
None of it mattered. Tigers fans waited 10 years for a playoff game in Detroit. In a few hours, the team could punch its ticket to the ALCS. Detroit will send MPC-TBD (More Pitching Chaos, To Be Determined) against Tanner Bibee (6:08 p.m. ET, TNT).
Yankees 3, Royals 2: With one underdog taking an ALDS series lead, Kansas City got its opportunity to carry the upset baton. Instead, we got the Giancarlo Stanton game.
Besieged in recent years by a persistent parade of nagging injuries, the 34-year-old designated hitter was the difference in the game. His fourth-inning double drove home the first run of the game, and his eighth-inning solo home run drove home the final one. He even stole a base, his first since Aug. 3, 2020!
The Royals’ best shot at tying the game came in the eighth inning. With Yankees closer Luke Weaver called upon for a five-out save, Bobby Witt Jr. singled for his first hit of the series. Had he stolen second base — he had 31 more steals than Stanton this year — Salvador Perez’s subsequent single would have tied it up. Instead, Kansas City had runners on the corners, which is where they stayed as Yuli Gurriel’s flyout ended the inning.
Game 4 will see Gerrit Cole and Michael Wacha in a rematch of Game 1 (8:08 p.m. ET, TBS).
Scary Scenes: Major damage to Tropicana Field
Like many of you, I spent last night with one eye on the baseball games and another tuned into coverage of Hurricane Milton as it bore down on the west coast of Florida. Late last night, social media and news reports began to emerge from St. Petersburg, where the roof of Tropicana Field, home of the Rays, had sustained significant damage.
The photos and videos are shocking. The signature white roof — made of “translucent, Teflon-coated fiberglass” — had massive holes, exposing huge areas to the elements.
The stadium had been in use as a staging area in the lead-up to Milton making landfall yesterday, and was expected to be used in the aftermath of the storm. In a social media post, the Rays were clear: it was not being used as a shelter during the worst of the storm. Fortunately, according to Jason Adams of ABC affiliate WFTS, no injuries were reported from the damage.
From a baseball perspective, the Rays were already expecting to move out of the Trop in the coming years — but not until 2028. The Tampa/St. Petersburg area is also home to a number of minor-league baseball parks.
You can follow The New York Times’ continuing live coverage here for further updates and reports on Hurricane Milton and its aftermath.
Handshakes and High Fives
An update to yesterday’s Diamond/Bally developments. Nothing was officially decided today, but as Evan Drellich reports, we should know soon whether any (or all) of the remaining eight teams in limbo will be on Bally Sports next year. There’s a major confirmation hearing on Nov. 14.
Advancing in the playoffs is always meaningful to a team and its fans. But for the longest-tenured Mets, it means just a little more.
If your team didn’t make the playoffs, we still have something for you: Jim Bowden ranked the 18 non-playoff teams based on their outlook for 2025.
The Arizona Fall League got underway this week. Melissa Lockard gave us one player from each team to keep an eye on.
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(Top photo: BRYAN R. SMITH/AFP via Getty Images)
