In Game 3, Braves rookie Ian Anderson made his World Series debut and threw five hitless innings, leading Atlanta to a 2-0 win over the Astros and a 2-1 series lead.
We’ll get the most important thing out of the way right off the bat—the Burgundy Boys. Joc Pederson, who had the night off, got to focus on his contribution for the night, a 2015 Chateau Lafite Rothschild. The wine, from Pauillac, France, can be found retailing for anywhere from $700 to $4,000 depending on your location. On his Instagram story @yungjoc650 wrote, “World Series wine club hits France … .again,” “Pour that man @ian_anderson15 some vinooooo 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥” and tagged pitchers Luke Jackson and Drew Smyly.
And it’s hard to argue that Anderson doesn’t deserve that vino. He now boasts a 4-0 record across eight postseason starts, he has a career postseason ERA of 1.26, he’s averaged just over 10 strikeouts per nine innings, and he’s only allowed one home run in 35.2 innings pitched. And sure, 35 innings isn’t a lot compared to someone like 38-year-old Game 4 starter Zack Greinke—who has thrown 109 innings across 16 different postseason series—but it’s a pretty damn good way of introducing yourself in the playoffs. This will be Greinke’s 10th postseason start for Houston, and his 21st postseason start overall across four teams (Milwaukee, 2011; Los Angeles, 2013-15; Arizona, 2017; Houston, 2019-21). However, he’s only pitched 2.1 innings in his two appearances this postseason, so I’d imagine that Dusty Baker is going to have Greinke on a pretty short leash.
After Anderson’s five inning no-hit bid, veteran Athletic reporter Jayson Stark wrote in his Weird and Wild column on Saturday morning that the odds are about as good that Anderson hits four home runs in one game as they are that he (or basically anyone) would finish a no hitter in the World Series. And he doesn’t say that to disparage Anderson—the one and only no hitter or perfect game in World Series history was thrown by Don Larsen 65 years ago this October, in 1956 between the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Yankees. Larsen earned series MVP honors with his performance in Game 5, when he threw a perfect game for the Yankees. With the series tied 2-2, Larsen retired all 27 batters he faced, and after the first inning no batter ever saw a three ball count, letting him close out the game on just 97 pitches (that’s less than four pitches per at bat on average). Larsen is the only single pitcher to ever face the minimum number of batters in the postseason, and the only time any team has ever sent the minimum number of batters to the plate since then was in the 2016 NLCS when Aroldis Chapman threw 1.2 innings of relief for lanky Dartmouth ‘13 Kyle Hendricks to complete a two-hit shutout of the Dodgers in the closeout Game 6.
In 2010, a full 54 years after Larsen’s perfect game, Roy Halladay threw the second no-hitter in postseason history for the Philadelphia Phillies against the Cincinnati Reds. In Game 1, Halladay faced 28 batters, walking one and striking out eight in a complete game shutout to open the NLDS. Having thrown a perfect game against the Marlins during the regular season that year, Halladay became the first and only pitcher to ever throw both a perfect game and a no hitter in the same season.
Now, for those of you who need a refresher, even though the Phillies 2010 postseason rotation featured two-time Cy Young winner (2003, 2010) Halladay’s 2.44 ERA backed up by Roy Oswalt (2.76) and Cole Hamels (3.06), they failed to advance to their third consecutive World Series thanks to our 2010 San Francisco Giants.
In Game 1 of the NLCS, Halladay was out-dueled by none other than 26-year-old Timothy Leroy Lincecum (3.43), who had won back-to-back NL Cy Young Awards in 2008 and 2009, his second and third seasons in the league. Both starters pitched seven innings, with Lincecum benefitting from one extra run of support from the Giants offense.
Though the Phillies beat Jonathan Sanchez (3.07) in Game 2 behind eight innings of one run ball from Oswalt, the Giants came back in Game 3 in San Francisco thanks to seven innings of scoreless ball from 25-year-old Matt Cain (3.14).
In Game 4, the starters again matched each other, with seven year veteran Joe Blanton (4.82) and rookie Madison Bumgarner (3.00) each throwing 4.2 innings and getting tagged for three runs. But it was Oswalt who gave up singles to Aubrey Huff (don’t talk about him) and Gerald that set up a walk-off sac fly by Juan Uribe.
Halladay and Lincecum swapped places for Game 5, and although both pitchers had only two earned runs it was Lincecum who took the loss in the rematch.
Game 6, which I absolutely did not remember, was a bullpen game for Bruce Bochy, as he had Sanchez, Jeremy Affeldt (4.14), and Bumgarner open the game with two innings apiece before Javier Lopez (2.34), Lincecum, and closer Brian Wilson (1.81) finished the game. Oswalt was able to outperform the Giants openers with one earned run in six innings, but an unearned run meant that the game was tied when he left after 99 pitches, and reliever Ryan Madson (2.55) allowed the Giants to score the go ahead run in the top of the 8th.
The Giants, as we will never forget, went on to take four of five games from the Texas Rangers to win the first championship since the franchise moved to San Francisco.
It cannot be overstated how much it took truly dominant pitching for the Giants to pull off their string of championships:
From 2010 to 2012, Matt Cain had a 2.94 ERA across 98 total starts with a record of 41 wins and 27 losses. He averaged 183 strikeouts and 221 innings pitched across the three seasons, and he had seven complete games and four shutouts during the span. In his two postseason runs with the Giants (2010, 2012) he started eight games, pitching 51.1 innings and compiling a career 2.10 postseason ERA including a 1.40 ERA in three NLCS starts and a 1.84 ERA in two World Series starts.
While Lincecum was technically active for the 2014 run to the championship, 54.9 of his 56.1 career postseason innings came in the 2010 and 2012 campaigns. In his playoff career he put together a 5-2 record with a 2.40 ERA across the seven series he actually played in (Lincecum was on the roster but did not play in the 2014 Wild Card, NLDS, or NLCS). In 20 innings in the three World Series, Lincecum had a 2.25 ERA, including a crucial appearance in the 2014 World Series that
If Cain and Lincecum were the regular season stars of the Giants, Bumgarner was San Francisco’s true postseason hero. In his 11 years with the Giants he helped them make four different playoff appearances (2010, 2012, 2014, 2016) in which he put together an incredible body of work headlined by a career 2.11 postseason ERA across 102.1 innings in 12 different series, including a mind-boggling 0.25 ERA in 36 innings pitched in the World Series.
As a reminder, we’re currently talking about how incredible it is that rookie Ian Anderson sits at 1.26 postseason ERA with 35.2 playoff innings under his belt. With the loss of Charlie Morton (3.34) the Braves are going to need both Anderson and Max Fried (3.04) to do their best 2014 Mad Bum impression, when he went 2-0 with a 0.43 ERA in three appearances in the World Series. That’s the kind of performance it takes to win when you either lose important arms or, as in Bumgarner’s case, if you’re the important arm. In 2014 Mad Bum was the only member of the rotation with an ERA below 3.50 and was being backed by 38-year-old Tim Hudson (3.57), 33-year-old Jake Peavy (who had a 2.17 ERA in 12 starts for SF but a 4.72 in 20 starts for Boston before being traded), long-man Yusmeiro Petit (3.69), and 36-year-old fan favorite Ryan Vogelsong (4.00).
With 37-year-old veteran leader Morton out for the rest of the postseason, Anderson and Fried find themselves in a similar position to that 2014 Giants staff. Just like those Giants, they have strong bullpen arms available to them in Luke Jackson (1.98), Tyler Matzek (2.57), and Will Smith (3.44). But of 11 qualified pitchers, Fried and Anderson are the only Braves starters left with sub-4.00 ERAs, so they’re going to have to give manager Brian Snitker some serious innings if he’s going to have any hope of patching together another two wins with what’s left of the bullpen and rotation.
Oh, and here are some more fun trivia bits from our dear Sarah Langs.