With minimal support, Skubal loses steam 2nd time through in NLCS loss to Brewers

MILWAUKEE -- Give the Dodgers' postseason rotation a few runs of support, and they can typically make them hold up.

Tarik Skubal left his team in a hole when he was done on the mound, but the bats could have dug their way out. But given how offense is at a premium this postseason -- and how L.A. has struggled with runners in scoring position -- it proved insurmountable as the Dodgers fell to the Brewers, 2-1, in Game 1 of the NL Championship Series on Sunday night at American Family Field.

In all best-of-seven postseason series, teams that have taken a 1-0 lead have gone on to win the series 127 of 197 times (64%). In series with the current 2-3-2 format, teams that have taken a 1-0 lead at home have gone on to win the series 69 of 103 times (67%).

The Dodgers are well-positioned for Game 2, when they'll try to even the series behind their ace, Yoshinobu Yamamoto. But as they saw in Game 1, they'll need more than just their pitching to take care of business.

"It’s the same as Skubal," Mookie Betts said. "Obviously, it matters what they do. But the offense has to find a way to get some more timely hits. We do have to keep applying pressure, but we’ve got to find a way to break through."

Sunday's highly anticipated matchup between two Cy Young Award-caliber arms -- Skubal, who won the award twice in the AL, and Jacob Misiorowski, this year's presumptive NL winner -- was indeed the difference. Both were out of the game after five innings.

The Dodgers struck first against Misiorowski, with Andy Pages knocking an RBI single in a second inning where they missed opportunities to do more damage by stranding the bases loaded. L.A. has just two hits in 27 plate appearances with runners in scoring position, both from Pages.

Misiorowski was out of the game with one out in the fifth inning, but Skubal did not last much longer. He was done after a high-stress fifth inning that raised his pitch count to 81. It was the shortest of his eight career postseason starts.

It was a tale of two trips through the order for Skubal, who was dominant through his first three innings. He retired nine of the first 10 Brewers he faced, striking out six of them.

Skubal pounded the zone early on, and his count leverage may have led to some uncharacteristic swings from the Brewers. During the regular season, they had a 24.1% whiff rate. They swung and missed at a 34% clip against Skubal overall, but they whiffed significantly more the first time through the order.

Innings 1-3: 12 whiffs on 22 swings (54.5%)
Innings 4-5: One whiff on 16 swings (6.3%)

"I think it's a pretty patient group to make you throw the ball in the zone to swing," Skubal said.

The Brewers came to life when they saw him for a second time. To open the fourth inning, Skubal fell behind 2-0 to Brice Turang, then tried to get back in the count by painting the inside corner with a sinker. Turang launched the offering a Statcast-projected 384 feet to left-center, out of reach of center fielder Pages, to tie the game.

Skubal's command began to falter in the fifth inning, when he issued a leadoff walk to Garrett Mitchell. Gifted a free base, the Brewers played their style of baseball to take the lead. Cooper Pratt bunted Mitchell over to second, and Mitchell scored on a base hit up the middle from Luis Lara.

"When the leadoff guy gets on sometimes by walking, he's a threat to steal, and sometimes that can alter the way the guy goes about it," Brewers manager Pat Murphy said. "The swing by Turang and then one pitch he left up to Lara, he was pretty dominant [otherwise]."

Said Skubal, who stranded the bases loaded to end the fifth: "The leadoff walk just can't happen. It gives them an opportunity to create something, and ultimately that's all they needed today."

The Dodgers' postseason rotation of Skubal, Yamamoto, Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow went a collective 32-0 when receiving at least three runs of support this year (including Skubal's starts with the Tigers before the Trade Deadline).

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It's a basic fact of baseball that teams need to score runs to win games. But even with minimal offense to back them, the Dodgers' starters can typically get the job done. This postseason, the Dodgers have scored at least three runs in their three wins, and fewer in their two losses.

It will take more than just an elite rotation for the Dodgers to get back to the World Series. They will have to do things well on all sides of the ball if their three-peat bid is to continue.

"You can't go into a long series against a team that has the best record in baseball and expect to just win four," manager Dave Roberts said. "It's going to be a long series. We knew it coming in. We had our chances, but they made plays, pitches when they needed to. We've just got to reset."