The Los Angeles Dodgers were already using their relief pitcher in the middle of the 4th inning, but with the kind of hitting they produced once again in the NLDS series against the Atlanta Braves, there was nothing stopping them from moving a step closer to finishing off the series.
Beating the Braves 13-6, the Dodgers took a 2-1 lead, getting some big displays from Hanley Ramirez and Yasiel Puig, while Carl Crawford and Juan Uribe got their first homers of the postseason. Julio Teheran, Alex Wood and Jordan Walden looked like they didn’t know what hit them as they gave up 14 hits and 13 runs in the game, being unable to get that final out, with the Dodgers posting 11 2-out RBIs in the game.
The only other time the Dodgers scored at least 13 runs in a postseason game was in Game 2 of the 1956 World Series against the Yankees. Things simply went their way, but things should happen like this from time to time when you amass so much talent on one team, and the atmosphere is a good one, unlike what happened with the Boston Red Sox in the previous two seasons.
It’s 25 guys out there that we come here every day and we put in hard work on the field. Everything I do, I do for my team and for the city. When I see a big smile from my teammates and my fans, that makes me happy. Guys were unhappy with the way they played, so we wanted to get back to playing the way we did the first game. We knew it was going to be at home in front of our home crowd, and we were going to have some extra energy for that. Hopefully, we can like wrap it up while we’re here at home.
The postseason is always about hitting the right stride at the right time, not paying attention to what happened in the regular season. The Dodgers are red hot right now, and excluding this game, they’ve been pitching very well too. Even without Hyun Jin Ryu having too strong of a performance, the Braves simply don’t have the depth to matchup with the Dodgers when the bats are rocketing like in game 3.
Ramirez has been especially on fire in his first career postseason series, hitting a .538 and slugging 1.231 so far, hitting his fourth double of the series and adding a triple while reaching 6 RBIs in the series against the Braves. Finally surrounded by the kind of talent to help his game-changing abilities bare some playoff fruit, he’s looking like the kind of player who wins MVPs for series, leading teams to go all the way.