Before LA Dodgers player Jack Flaherty stepped up for his second playoff start, he was already at ease. Supported in the crowd by friends he’d known since his days playing for Sherman Oaks Little League and his mother behind home plate, Flaherty was stepping back onto a field that was no stranger to him. Over a decade ago, he had led his Harvard-Westlake junior team to victory, delivering seven scoreless innings in the Southern Section Division I championship game. Now he was back with the same goal, to bring his team to victory, but in a game with significantly higher stakes.
Flaherty’s Game 1 performance was monumental, pushing the Dodgers to a 9-0 victory against the Mets which kicked off the National League Championship Series. Besides moving the Dodgers to a favourable position within the series, Flaherty’s performance also allowed the team to make history, tying the LA Dodgers’ pitching staff’s scoreless innings streak of 33, to a record hit by the 1966 Orioles. A special attribute of this victory was the way it allowed team manager Dave Roberts to ration his resources, knowing that the Dodgers’ lack of starting pitching options would mean that bullpen games would be needed at some point.
Flaherty’s strong performance allowed the Dodgers to save their high-leverage relievers for the second game of the series. With an off-day to rest on Tuesday, these players will now be able to reset ahead of the third and fourth games in New York with Walker Buehler and Yoshinobu Yamamoto well-rested. The team has been struggling in recent years with a lack of starting pitchers, a factor contributing to their defeat in 2023. This year, however, the team has managed to work past this hurdle.
There was significant back and forth leading up to the Dodgers’ trade deadline, with discussions involving a potential trade with the Detroit for Flaherty. At the last minute, the Tigers returned to the negotiations and Flaherty was able to move to the LA Dodgers. Despite being seen initially as an addition to the postseason rotation, with Tyler Glasnow and Gavin Stone out for the year, Flaherty’s position in the team has become indispensable.
Flaherty’s flawless performance on Sunday night ended a worrying streak for the Dodgers. Until Flaherty’s fantastic game, no Dodgers starting pitcher had been able to deliver six innings in the previous 20 playoff games they had played. Max Scherzer was the last Dodgers player to achieve this feat in 2021, another year where the Dodgers had to fight hard to avoid elimination.
With the triumph came an emotional moment for Flaherty, a moment where he was no longer able to keep his cool composure. As the home crowd of 53,503 stood to give him a standing ovation, he was unable to hold back a smile. Growing up as a Dodgers fan, attending games with his mother and idolising players such as Clayton Kershaw, to now be playing for the team and receiving a hug from Kershaw himself, was an experience that Flaherty describes as “special.”
