Emmet Sheehan’s dominant outing and late-inning power surged the Los Angeles Dodgers closer to a first-round bye.
The Los Angeles Dodgers successfully completed a three-game sweep over the San Francisco Giants.
As part of their 3-1 win on Sunday, Sept. 20, the magic number to clinch a first-round bye officially falls to three.
Remember, this magic number will go down with any combination of a Dodgers win or an Atlanta Braves loss.
Seeing as both teams are off on Monday, Sept. 21, the soonest that the Dodgers could secure the bye is Wednesday, Sept. 23.
In order to do so in the shortest amount of time, there are two possibilities:
- Dodgers win the first two games against the San Diego Padres, Braves drop one of their first two against the Cincinnati Reds.
- Braves drop their first two against the Reds, Dodgers win one of their first two against the Padres.
At the very least, the Dodgers know they can control their own fate. Should the Braves win out, all the Dodgers need to do is go 3-3 in their final six games, and that includes another three against the same Giants team they just swept.
Dodgers are peaking at the right time
One could argue LA has the benefit of playing the Giants six times in their last nine games, but at the end of the day, they're not the ones making the schedule.
No one expected the Giants to be 64-92 at this point in the season, so it's not the Dodgers' fault they have a ton of very winnable games down the stretch.
With this team getting older and the health of a few star players in question, the first-round bye would mean everything.
Sure, rookie sensation Josue De Paula put on a show against San Francisco, but no one knows exactly what his role will be on the postseason roster.
For now, the Dodgers need to make the most of their final day off, and then they can focus on potentially sweeping the Padres in their final home series of the year to lock up the first-round bye as soon as possible.
Emmet Sheehan shines in 3-1 win
It was a spot-start for Jack Dreyer against the Giants, but then Emmet Sheehan came in and allowed just one hit in 5.1 innings.
Despite striking out nine batters, he didn't pick up the win because this was a 1-1 game until the Dodgers pulled away late.
LA trailed 1-0 through the first five innings, but then they scored a run in the sixth, seventh, and eighth innings.
Tommy Edman crushed his seventh home run of the year in the sixth inning, and then Max Muncy and Enrique Hernandez also drove in runs.
