This is a preview of the Joe Sheehan Baseball Newsletter, an e-mail newsletter about all things baseball, featuring analysis and opinion about the game on and off the field from the perspective of the informed outsider.
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It’s fair to say things have changed. Through eight playoff games, Dodgers starters have thrown nearly as many innings -- 52 2/3 -- as they did during last year’s entire run. They’ve thrown 71% of the team’s innings as a whole, a percentage that didn’t seem possible in modern baseball. It’s actually more extreme than that because the Dodgers ended the year with a six-man rotation and a bad bullpen. Of their 74 innings pitched, just 8 1/3 have been thrown by true relievers. Roki Sasaki, Emmet Sheehan, Clayton Kershaw, and Glasnow, all starting pitchers in 2025, have thrown 13 innings out of the pen.
The quality of those innings has been exceptional: a 1.54 ERA, a 63/13 K/BB, a 32% strikeout rate. Seven of the Dodgers’ eight starts have been quality starts -- at least six innings, no more than three earned runs. In the entire 2024 postseason, there were just 18 quality starts by all pitchers. The Dodgers, with seven, already are tied for the most postseason quality starts of any team since 2019 (Nationals, 9), and are likely to have the most since the Tigers had ten in 2013.
The quality of those innings has been exceptional: a 1.54 ERA, a 63/13 K/BB, a 32% strikeout rate. Seven of the Dodgers’ eight starts have been quality starts -- at least six innings, no more than three earned runs. In the entire 2024 postseason, there were just 18 quality starts by all pitchers. The Dodgers, with seven, already are tied for the most postseason quality starts of any team since 2019 (Nationals, 9), and are likely to have the most since the Tigers had ten in 2013.
