D2 EZ M2 THE WASHINGTON POST.WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 27 , 2021
came Baker, first to get the ball
from Ortiz — and then hand him
the ball back as a keepsake.
“I was blasted for taking Russ
Ortiz out [19] years ago,” Baker
said. “But nowadays, I’d have
been blasted for not taking him
out.”
He’s right, though it’s worth
pointing out the most egregious
example of Preemptive Starter
Removal Theater came in the
final game of the 2020 season,
the Dodgers’ victory over Tampa
Bay in Game 6 of the World
Series. Rays starter Blake Snell
gave up two hits. He struck out
nine. But he faced 18 hitters —
exactly twice through the lineup
— so here came Rays Manager
Kevin Cash. It didn’t work.
Reliever Nick Anderson gave up
the double and wild pitch that
flipped the game — and clinched
the series for Los Angeles.
It’s worth noting that on that
night a year ago, the Dodgers
used an opener — Tony Gonsolin.
Of the seven pitchers they used
in that game, the man who
recorded the most outs — seven
— was Urías, who closed.
That is where we are: Sometimes
the strategy to win on a given
night doesn’t match up with the
best way to build up a matchup.
Game 2 on Wednesday night pits
José Urquidy for Houston
against Max Fried for Atlanta.
Who knows what that means —
or how long they’ll last?
[email protected]For more by Barry Svrluga, visit
washingtonpost.com/svrluga.SOCCER
Kansas City NWSL
to get its own stadium
The owners of Kansas City’s
professional women’s soccer
team announced Tuesday that
they plan to build a $70 million
stadium for the team.
The stadium for Kansas City
NWSL will be the first built in the
United States specifically for a
women’s soccer team.
Team owners Angie Long,
Chris Long and Brittany
Matthews announced the 11,000-
seat stadium will be built along
the Missouri River close to
downtown Kansas City, Mo. It
will be privately financed....
Chelsea advanced in the
League Cup thanks to its third
penalty shootout success of the
season. Arsenal had a smoother
path into the quarterfinals.
Reece James netted the
penalty that sealed Chelsea’s 4-3
victory against Southampton in
the shootout at Stamford Bridge.
Thomas Tuchel’s Premier
League leaders had reached the
fourth round by beating Aston
Villa on penalties, having also
started the season by winning the
UEFA Super Cup in a shootout
against Villarreal in August.
There was another all-Premier
League encounter in London at
Emirates Stadium, where Arsenal
beat Leeds, 2-0....
Arnaut Danjuma scored five
minutes into stoppage time as
host Villarreal salvaged a 3-3
draw against Cádiz in the
Spanish league. Danjuma got the
equalizer with a shot from inside
the area to keep Unai Emery’s
team from losing its third league
match in a row.
Anthony “Choco” Lozano
recorded a hat trick for Cádiz,
whose winless streak reached six
matches....
AC Milan again struggled in a
1-0 home win in which it moved
three points clear at the top of the
Italian Serie A.
Olivier Giroud scored the only
goal of the match in the 14th
minute to help Milan move clear
of second-place Napoli....
Substitute Thorgan Hazard
scored both goals and got
defending champion Borussia
Dortmund a spot in the thirdround of the German Cup.
Host Dortmund beat second-
division club Ingolstadt, 2-0.
Wolfsburg appointed former
Werder Bremen coach Florian
Kohfeldt to take over the team
following Mark van Bommel’s
dismissal.
The Volkswagen-backed club
said the 39-year-old Kohfeldt was
getting a contract through 2023
and would start coaching the
team T hursday.TENNIS
Stefanos Tsitsipas saved three
set points before beating Grigor
Dimitrov, 7-6 (8 -6), 6-4, in
Vienna to join Olympic champion
Alexander Zverev in the second
round of the Erste Bank Open.
Zverev also advanced in
straight sets but had to rally from
5-2 down in the second to
overcome Filip Krajinovic, 6-2,
7-5....
American players Taylor Fritz,
Mackenzie McDonald and
Tommy Paul all won their first-
round matches at the St.
Petersburg Open.
The fifth-seeded Fritz beat
Finnish qualifier EmilRuusuvuori, 6-1, 6-4, and will
next face Paul, who defeated
Spanish player Pedro Martinez,
6-3, 6-2. McDonald beat Egor
Gerasimov of Belarus, 7-5, 6-4,
and will next play third-seeded
Roberto Bautista Agut....
Emma Raducanu rallied to
beat Polona Hercog of Slovenia,
4-6, 7-5, 6-1, at the Transylvania
Open in Cluj-Napoca, Romania,
for her first win since her
stunning run to the U.S. Open
title more than six weeks ago.
It was also the teenager’s first
victory on the WTA Tour.MISC.
The Atlanta Dream announced
the hiring of Dan Padover as
general manager and executive
vice president of basketball
operations, with former interim
head coach Darius Taylor taking
over as assistant GM....
Clemson running back Kobe
Pace will miss Saturday’s football
game with Florida State because
he is in covid-19 protocol. The 5-
foot-10, 210-pounder has started
five games and leads the team
with 327 yards on 59 carries.
— From news s ervicesDIGEST
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5 a.m. ATP: Vienna Open and St. Petersburg Open, early rounds;
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» Tennis Channel
WOMEN’S COLLEGE VOLLEYBALL
6 p.m. Kentucky at Tennessee » ESPNU
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COLLEGE GOLF
3 p.m. East Lake Cup, match play championship » Golf Channelinning of a tie game of the ALCS;
Eovaldi gave up four runs, and
the Red Sox lost. Three days
later, Eovaldi lasted only one out
into the fifth before Cora yanked
him. Dodgers Manager Dave
Roberts used lefty Julio Urías in
the eighth inning of a one-run
Game 2 of the NLCS; Urias
coughed up the lead. Three days
later, Urias gave up five runs in
five innings.
Somebody such as Astros
Manager Dusty Baker — who
played in his first major league
game 53 years ago and managed
his first major league game 28
years ago — must have an
opinion on this.
“I think the circumstances
have changed more than I’ve
changed,” Baker said. “The use of
pitchers and the short hook and
the more importance of the
bullpen now than it was 20 years
ago ...”
Baker has a perfect example
from his long, accomplished,
colorful past: Game 6 of the 2002
World Series. In a g ame that
could have clinched a
championship, his San Francisco
Giants held a 5-0 lead over the
Anaheim Angels. Right-hander
Russ Ortiz was cruising, having
allowed just two hits and two
walks, surviving a sixth inning in
which he faced the top three
hitters in Anaheim’s lineup for a
third time — before such a
phenomenon had been analyzed.
In the seventh, Ortiz got a
groundout, then he allowed
back-to-back singles to Troy
Glaus and Brad Fullmer. Herematter but should give you a feel
for how the game will play out.
When the answer is, say, the New
York Mets’ Jacob deGrom, it’s
obvious in one way: power
pitching, base runners at a
premium, strikeouts by the
bushel. When the answer is, say,
the Chicago Cubs’ Kyle
Hendricks, it’s the opposite:
finesse, soft contact, a different
but distinct style.
But something is lost when the
answer to “Who’s pitching?” is
“Everybody!”
So here we have this
postseason, in which there have
now been 64 games. Thirty-eight
times, the starter didn’t complete
five innings — sometimes by
design, sometimes by
circumstance, sometimes by
performance. Thirty times, the
starter didn’t complete four
innings. Twenty-one times —
almost a third — the starter
didn’t get the measly nine outs it
takes to complete three innings.
That puts an inordinate
amount of pressure on managers
and bullpens. It alters the flow of
a series, because sometimes the
flood of relievers includes a
normal starter — whether it
works or not.
There are examples all over
the place. Boston Manager Alex
Cora used his best starter,
Nathan Eovaldi, in the ninthessentially two outs in the fourth.
As franchises, they aren’t
anomalies. They’re more the
norm. Of the eight teams that
reached the division series, only
two — Milwaukee and San
Francisco — got more outs from
their starters than their relievers.
Is it a coincidence that neither of
those teams advanced beyond
that round? Probably. But this is
a phenomenon that’s strangling
the game.
There is, of course, a reason
behind it. The prevailing notion
in baseball — backed up, in most
cases, by the numbers — is that
pitchers are at a d istinct
disadvantage when they start to
go through a lineup for the third
time. Take Morton as an
example: In 33 starts for Atlanta
during the regular season, hitters
had a .497 on-base-plus-slugging
percentage against him their
first time up, a .624 OPS the
second time and a .698 OPS the
third time. A sign of both his age
and the times: Morton never
faced a hitter four times in a
single night and completed
seven innings six times.
And he’s actually a starter.
That teams use relievers as
“openers” isn’t exactly a new
concept, but it affects the way we
process the discussion about the
game. Looking up who pitches
on a given night should not onlyestablished and far from a small
sample: Starters do less.
Relievers do more. The game is
tilted off its axis. And who knows
when — or if — it will tilt back?
Consider that the last two
teams standing arrived at this
World Series not because their
starters routinely pitched
effectively deep into games but
because the expectations are so
low from the first pitch that a
five-inning effort can seem solid,
a seven-inning stint monstrous,
an eight-inning outing
superhuman. That’s what Valdez
delivered in his most recent
start, a series-changing victory
over Boston in Game 5 of the
American League Championship
Series.
That’s an absolute outlier.
Only one other pitcher this entire
postseason — San Francisco’s
Logan Webb — so much as saw
the eighth inning. Only two
others — Webb in his second
National League Division Series
outing and Max Scherzer of the
Los Angeles Dodgers —
completed seven. The Astros and
Braves have each played 11 games
in this postseason. Atlanta’s
starters average 4.21 innings —
recording less than an out in the
fifth. Houston’s rotation
manages 3.64 innings — orSVRLUGA FROM D1BARRY SVRLUGAIt’s a shame pitchers rarely go deep anymore
BY DES BIELERChicago Blackhawks general
manager Stan Bowman resigned
Tuesday and the team was fined
$2 million by the NHL after an
investigation determined Bow-
man and other team executives
failed to take sufficient action af-
ter being informed of an alleged
sexual assault in 2010.
The investigation, undertaken
by law firm Jenner & Block, fol-
lowed two lawsuits filed against
the Blackhawks. In one, a former
player alleged the team’s then-vid-
eo coach, Brad Aldrich, sexually
assaulted him in 2010. The second
lawsuit alleged Aldrich sexually
assaulted a high school player in
2013 after the Blackhawks provid-
ed Aldrich with positive job refer-
ences that led to a position at the
school.
Bowman, who oversaw three
Stanley Cup championships with
the Blackhawks, said he was step-
ping down because he didn’t want
to become “a distraction.” Al
M acIsaac, the senior vice presi-
dent of hockey operations, also
left the organization.
Bowman also stepped down as
general manager of the U.S. Olym-
pic hockey team.
According to the report, Bow-
man was among five members of
Blackhawks senior management,
plus then-coach Joel Quenneville,
who were informed about two
weeks after the May 2010 incident
of the sexual harassment allega-
tions made by one of their players,
identified as John Doe. Aldrich
told investigators the encounter
was consensual.
Along with Bowman, MacIsaac
and Quenneville, the senior exec-
utives who learned of the encoun-
ter were team president John Mc-
Donough, executive vice presi-
dent Jay Blunk and assistant gen-
eral manager Kevin Cheveldayoff.
None are still with the Black-
hawks; Cheveldayoff is the gener-
al manager of the Winnipeg Jets,
and Quenneville coaches the Flor-
ida Panthers.
NHL Commissioner Gary Bett-
man said Tuesday that he plans to
meet soon with Cheveldayoff and
Quenneville and that he “will re-
serve judgment on next steps, if
any, w ith respect to them.”
After learning of Doe’s com-
plaint, the Blackhawks executives
took no action, per the report,
until McDonough informed the
team’s human resources director
June 14, about three weeks after
the meeting. That was five days
after Chicago won the Stanley
Cup for the first time since 1961,
and the on-ice celebration includ-
ed Aldrich raising the trophy. Per
the report, Aldrich made an un-
wanted sexual advance to a team
intern the next day.
On June 16, Aldrich was said to
have been given by the team’s
human resources director the op-
tion of resigning or submitting to
an investigation of Doe’s allega-
tions. He chose to leave the or-
ganization with severance pay
and a pl ayoff bonus. Aldrich went
on to positions with USA Hockey
and two college programs before
landing at a h igh school in Michi-
gan, where he was arrested in
2013 and pleaded guilty to having
sexual contact with a minor.
Blackhawks CEO Danny Wirtz
said Kyle Davidson, the team’s
vice president of hockey strategy
and analytics, will take over as
interim general manager.
[email protected]
Blackhawks
failed to act
on assault
allegations
franchise.
Carlos Correa drove in a run for
the Astros with g roundout in the
eighth, but other than that, the
Atlanta bullpen held. Key reliev-
ers Minter and Tyler Matzek faced
more batters than they might usu-
ally. The Br aves might find them-
selves down a few arms in Game 2
on Wednesday. Morton will be
relegated to moral support, which
teammates past and present say
was always his greatest strength
anyway. As for what happens on
the field, the Braves will have to
figure that out without him. They
are three wins from figuring
things out all the way to a World
Series title.
[email protected]things out, circumstances in
which the Astros have turned to
left-hander A.J. Minter before.
Minter had not pitched more
than two innings in any outing
this season. He threw 2^2 / 3 innings
and allowed one run that
wouldn’t have scored were it not
for an error. He threw a career-
high 43 pitches, making it work.
Minter has thrown 10 innings in
this postseason, allowed one run
and struck out 14.
Every Atlanta hitter had at
least one hit by the sixth inning.
The Braves added a run in the
eighth on a Freddie Freeman sac-
rifice fly, the first World Series
RBI for the man with the seventh-
most RBI in the long history of theinning of their first World Series
game together, those four new
outfielders were 4 for 8 with three
RBI and three runs.
At first, that effort came in
support of Morton, who closed
out the now-controversial 20 17
World Series for the Astros. Mor-
ton walked two to help the Astros
load the bases in the first inning
Tuesday night, then got out of it
thanks to an impressive play by
Albies at second base to end the
inning. He set the Astros down in
order in the second. He struck out
Altuve looking to start the third.
Then a trainer came out. Morton
had gotten three outs on a broken
leg.
So it was time to start figuringfore the National League Champi-
onship Series, Atlanta replaced
him at the top of the order with
Eddie Rosario, who went on to
become the series MVP.
After Soler’s shot, Ozzie Albies
singled and stole second base and
Austin Riley doubled. Atlanta had
made clear that it is more than
simply happy to be on this stage.
The Br aves spent Monday oozing
gratitude for the chance to be
here. They spent Tuesday proving
they belonged.
Joc Pederson singled as part of
a rally that yielded one run in the
second. Rosario led off the third
with a single and scored when
Adam Duvall homered to make it
5-0, chasing Valdez. By the thirdfibula.
This is Morton — humble, de-
termined, dutiful. And these are
the Braves — beaten, bruised, and
barreling through the playoffs all
the same. Even without Morton,
they took a series lead on one of
the best hitting teams of this gen-
eration. Even without Morton,
they secured their first win in a
World Series game since 1996 as
they seek their first title since
1995.
Whether Atlanta can survive
the loss of Morton remains to be
seen. The cerebral 37-year-old
seemed certain to start again later
this series, likely at an even more
crucial moment. Atlanta is now
down to two surefire starters. It
will have to piece things together
somehow, which may be just fine:
Piecing things together is how the
Braves got here.
That Atlanta would be in the
World Series at all, let alone lead-
ing it, was at best a possibility, at
worst an unlikelihood and never
an expectation. That the Braves
would be here without superstar
Ronald Acuña Jr. was nearly un-
thinkable. But in need of a new
outfield, General Manager Alex
Anthopoulos traded for four new
outfielders — all of whom “hit,”
literally and figuratively.
Soler hit first Tuesday night. He
took Astros left-hander Framber
Valdez’s third pitch of the game
out to left field — and did so
emphatically enough that left
fielder Michael Brantley hardly
moved. No one had ever hit a
leadoff home run in the first game
of the World Series. Had Acuña
been healthy, he would have been
a strong candidate to do so. Soler
did it instead.
The key to Atlanta’s season, as
the players say, is rolling with the
punches. When injuries threat-
ened their core early in the sea-
son, they built a new core and
figured it out. When Soler tested
positive for the coronavirus be-WORLD SERIES FROM D1Soler’s leado≠ home run sets the tone for Braves
DAVID J. PHILLIP/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Braves second baseman Ozzie Albies tags out the Astros’ Yuli Gurriel at second during the eighth inning of the visitors’ 6-2 triumph.