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Exactly 25 hours before the biggest game of his team’s season, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts was only sure of one thing about his pitching plans for Game 5 in the National League Division Series on Friday night.
“Obviously, I’m sure Yoshinobu will be a part of it,” Roberts said Thursday, referring to $325-million offseason signing, and Game 1 starter, Yoshinobu Yamamoto.
What does that mean exactly?
“I just don’t know,” Roberts said.
Or, at least, he wasn’t ready to say yet.
When the Dodgers made a late change to their starting rotation for this series last week, they did it with Game 5 largely in mind.
Read more: Hernández: Don’t overthink it, Dodgers. Game 5 should be another bullpen game
After initially announcing that trade deadline acquisition Jack Flaherty would start Game 1, the Dodgers instead bumped Yamamoto up to the opener and Flaherty to Game 2.
The idea was to keep both pitchers available for a potential fifth game, giving Yamamoto his standard five days of rest (a schedule he has followed all season since arriving from Japan) and Flaherty the typical four days off most MLB starters take before starts.
However, circumstances have changed in the four games since, which the Dodgers and San Diego Padres split to set up Friday’s winner-take-all showdown.
Yamamoto was not only knocked around in Game 1, giving up five runs in three innings, but was also believed to be tipping his pitches, a problem that plagued him early in his rookie MLB season.
Flaherty, meanwhile, was only slightly better in Game 2, managing to pitch into the sixth inning but also giving up four runs in a loss.
Then, of course, there was the success the Dodgers found in a Game 4 bullpen game, shutting the Padres out on a night eight different relievers combined for nine dominant innings.
It set up a question that surrounded Thursday’s off-day: Would the Dodgers go with a traditional start from Yamamoto or Flaherty, or run back a bullpen plan that was tantalizingly effective in Wednesday’s elimination-game win.
The answer, it appears, might be somewhere in the middle.
Yamamoto seems likely to pitch at some point. Flaherty will also be available, according to Roberts. But the appeal of another bullpen game still beckons — maybe one in which Yamamoto and/or Flaherty handle a few innings, but leave the bulk of the game to a lockdown relief corps.
“We’re still talking through it,” Roberts said. “I think the main variable is seeing our [relief] guys go out there today, play catch, see how they feel, which will give us a little bit more information on ultimately who takes the brunt of the game, who starts the game.”
“But coming off of what they did last night,” Roberts added of the bullpen, “makes everyone feel pretty confident going into Game 5.”
The simplest scenario could be the Dodgers using an opener in front of Yamamoto, and having him come out of the bullpen for bulk innings.
Yamamoto has pitched out of the bullpen before in his career, both as a young pitcher in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball league and during last year’s World Baseball Classic with the country’s national team.
Roberts said Yamamoto told the team he’s open to do so again on Friday night.
“I just feel he’ll do whatever we ask,” Roberts said.
As for Yamamoto’s potential pitch-tipping issue in Game 1, Roberts said the 25-year-old right-hander has “cleaned stuff up” over the last week.
“Where Yoshinobu is at, I feel really comfortable,” Roberts said.
That didn’t stop Roberts from illustrating the advantages of a more bullpen-heavy pitching plan — especially considering the 0.93 ERA the team’s seven leverage relievers (Michael Kopech, Blake Treinen, Evan Phillips, Daniel Hudson, Ryan Brasier, Alex Vesia and Anthony Banda) have combined for this series.
Read more: Shaikin: Dodgers want fans fired up for Game 5. ‘Bring the energy, but be smart about it’
“You have a lot of neutrality with our guys,” Roberts said. “I feel that we have a lot of different guys that we can kind of deploy in certain lanes or certain spots.”
Where Yamamoto, or anyone else on the staff, fits into the script for Friday remains to be seen.
“I think our only focus,” Roberts said, “is finding the best pitchers to prevent runs tomorrow.”
It’s a task that will determine the fate of the Dodgers’ season.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
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