There's no such thing as too big of a lead in the World Series clincher, so it said volumes about Hinch's confidence in Morton (and, by extension, his possible lack of confidence in his other options), that he let Morton bat to lead off the ninth even with Carlos Beltran available (Morton struck out). Morton wouldn't allow a baserunner the rest of the way. The Morton when curve-splitter-fastball-splitter to strike out Taylor and got Seager to ground out softly to short on the first pitch he saw (while almost impaling Morton with a bat shard). Then veteran Andre Ethier pinch hit for Clayton Kershaw and singled to right to plate Pederson and push Logan Forsythe to scoring position. Morton allowed the first two to reach before getting Austin Barnes to pop out. It would be his last pitching change of the night. Then it was Charlie Morton, whom Hinch double-switched into the game to start the sixth. Then it was Chris Devenski, who got Puig to line out to first base on a 96-mph fastball up and in. Then Hinch called on Francisco Liriano to face lefty Cody Bellinger, who grounded into a fielder's choice. Chris Taylor flew out, but then Peacock yielded a walk to Corey Seager and a single to Justin Turner. In the fourth, Peacock retired the 7-8-9 hitters in order. He got Yasiel Puig to fly out to center and then struck out Joc Pederson to end the third. Peacock, the hero of Game 3, drew the first assignment. That meant the Astros would need 20 outs from a bullpen that had theretofore been a pronounced World Series liability.
McCullers, the Game 7 starter for the Astros, kept Los Angeles off the board, but he lasted just 2 1/3 innings - the shortest outing for a Houston starter this series. In Game 7, though, those bullpen-wide trends flipped at just the right time. Think of Lance McCullers in Game 7 of the ALCS and Brad Peacock in Game 3 of the World Series. As a partial consequence, you saw some Houston primary starters picking up the load, sometimes in "piggyback" fashion. That goes back to earlier in the postseason, when short-run struggles appeared to cause Hinch to lose faith in those relievers. Hinch has been unable to wring outs consistently from the relievers that anchored his bullpen during the regular season - guys like Ken Giles, Chris Devenski, and Joe Musgrove. Coming into Game 7, the Houston relief corps had a 7.29 ERA, which was the third-worst World Series bullpen ERA ever (just the 1960 Pirates and 2011 Rangers had worse marks).Īs the series has unfolded, Astros manager A.J. LOS ANGELES- The performance of the Astros' bullpen through the first six games of the 2017 World Series against the Dodgers was almost unthinkably grim.
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