While Monday night’s World Series Game 3 victory might not qualify as Pyrrhic, it definitely came at a price for the Rangers. After three scoreless innings, starter Max Scherzer left with back tightness, forcing Jon Gray into an impromptu piggyback start. Adolis García, who is in the midst of a jaw-dropping, record-setting postseason run, left after seven innings with left side tightness. Meanwhile, two days removed from stealing one on the road in Texas, the Diamondbacks must feel deflated, losing 3-1 despite outhitting the Rangers, six hits to five. Texas now boast a 2-1 series lead.
Coming in, the question was about Scherzer’s thumb, which had developed a cut just below the base of the nail. He reportedly kept the wound from reopening with a concoction of super glue and cotton. It’s hard to say, but it could have had an effect on his pitching. Scherzer’s spin rate was below his season average on all five of his pitches (even during the first two innings, when his velocity was above his season average), and his curveball, slider, and changeup all had less movement than usual. Until his injury, Scherzer seemed to be benefitting from luck. He walked two and allowed two hits over his three innings, but he kept the Diamondbacks off the scoreboard by virtue of a double play, an outfield assist on some bad baserunning in the second inning, and a fortunate bounce on a comebacker.
Arizona’s biggest threat against Scherzer came in the second inning. Christian Walker led off with a double off the base of the center field wall. Up second in the inning, Tommy Pham notched his fifth consecutive hit with a single into right field (he recorded four hits in Game 2), but Walker missed the stop sign from third base coach Tony Perezchica. As you might recall, right field is where Adolis García likes to keep his bazooka. He unleashed a 94.6 mph throw to the plate, nailing Walker:
Instead of first and third with no outs, it was a runner on first with one out.
After Scherzer induced a pop-out from Lourdes Gurriel Jr., Alek Thomas hit a rocket right back up the middle on one hop. Scherzer turned around and the ball bounced off the back of his pitching elbow, then his back, and finally, amazingly, right to third baseman Josh Jung, who made a barehanded play and caught the lightning quick Thomas at first to end the inning:
It’s unclear whether the play had anything to do with it, but after a scoreless third, Scherzer’s back tightened up. He came out to pitch the top of the fourth, but just climbing up the steps of the dugout left him in obvious pain. Scherzer tried to gut it out, but couldn’t even get through his warmup pitches. In a sign of just how many television cameras there are at the World Series, a camera caught Texas GM Chris Young in his suite watching Scherzer try to warm up. “He should pull him,” said Young. Then he said an angry word.
Rangers manager Bruce Bochy did indeed pull Scherzer and brought in Gray, who had not even been warming up in the bullpen. Gray came into this postseason with just one relief appearance in his entire career, but in his two prior appearances out of the ‘pen this October, he had run a 3.38 ERA and a 0.63 FIP. He lowered that ERA to 1.50 on Monday, striking out three and allowing just one hit over 3.1 scoreless innings. Said Marcus Semien after the game, “Facing him on off days, with the at-bats, I knew he was going to be good.”
For the Diamondbacks, the question was whether rookie Brandon Pfaadt could live up to the 2.70 ERA and 2.72 FIP he’d run through his first four postseason starts. While Pfaadt didn’t remain completely unhittable, he did just about everything that could reasonably be asked of him. Unfortunately, he was asked to do something that has grown increasingly unreasonable over the past couple months: get Corey Seager out. Pfaadt is only human. We can’t say the same for Seager with any degree of certainty. Pfaadt allowed eight hard-hit balls, but held the Rangers to four hits and three runs over 5.1 innings. He needed just 21 pitches to get through the first two innings, after which Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo offered on the broadcast, “I think it’s some good life on his fastball, and he got right to his secondary stuff. It was working from the get-go.”
The trouble came in the third. Leadoff batter Nathaniel Lowe finally notched his first hit of the series, a double into center field. Pfaadt struck out Jung swinging, then induced a groundout from Leody Taveras that moved Lowe to third. Pfaadt was one batter away from getting out of the inning, but that batter was Semien, who singled into left field to score Lowe:
The Rangers took a 1-0 lead, and if that wasn’t bad enough, it brought Seager to the plate. Pitching coach Brent Strom went out to talk to Pfaadt and presumably said, “Look, if I had any idea how to get this guy out, I would’ve already told you.” Pfaadt tried to keep Seager off balance with a first pitch changeup. He did not succeed:
Seager’s 114.5 mph rocket into right field made it 3-0 Rangers. It was the hardest hit home run ever recorded during the World Series. During this Fall Classic, there have now been five balls hit harder than 114 mph — Seager has hit three of them. Initially, Baseball Savant listed the result of the play as “undefined.” Corey Seager can hit at baseball hard enough that even a robot has trouble comprehending it:
Pfaadt was succeeded by Miguel Castro, Kyle Nelson, Luis Frias, and Andrew Saalfrank, who combined to allow just two baserunners over 3.2 innings. Once Gray finished his stellar outing, Josh Sborz fired a scoreless seventh inning for the Rangers, though it was interrupted by a visit from a trainer, who had seen something he didn’t like from the bench. Sborz seemed to assure him he was fine and fired a warmup pitch to bolster his case.
The Diamondbacks finally broke through in the eighth. Lovullo sent Pavin Smith in to pinch-hit for Evan Longoria, which prompted Bochy to send in Aroldis Chapman for Sborz, which prompted Lovullo to send in Emmanuel Rivera. Bochy resisted the urge to keep swapping in players until both rosters had been depleted. He stopped the cycle and let Chapman pitch to Rivera, which turned out to be his biggest mistake of the night, as Rivera sliced a double down the right field line. Chapman, who has spent the entire postseason working his way into and out of jams, finally gave in, allowing Geraldo Perdomo to single softly into left field to score Rivera:
With the score now 3-1, Corbin Carroll came to the plate as the tying run. Carroll had five hard-hit balls in Games 1 and 2, bringing him halfway to the rookie record set by Yordan Alvarez in 2019. However, Carroll struck out looking on a slider, and the Rangers got yet another fortunate bounce when Ketel Marte hit an absolute rocket to the left side of second base. At 114.4 mph, it was just one-tenth of a mile an hour slower than Seager’s home run, but Seager managed to snag it and had enough time (if only barely) to start an inning-ending double play:
José Leclerc set the Diamondbacks down in order in the ninth, and the game was over.
While Scherzer’s injury is not ideal, especially since he would line up to pitch in a potential Game 7, García’s injury is the real worry. He flied out to very deep center in the eighth inning, but immediately grabbed his side after the swing, and Travis Jankowski replaced him in right in the bottom of the inning. What initially appeared to be a back injury was reported to be “left side tightness,” which raises the prospect of an oblique injury. That would be a devastating blow, both because of the way he has been swinging the bat and what he means to the team. After the game, Bochy had this to say about his injured players:
Right now we’re going to just evaluate them. Doli, will get some diagnostics done. See where he’s at. Left-side tightness. We’re being optimistic there but we’ll know more tomorrow.
The same with Max. Max took a pretty good shot on the elbow. That’s what we were concerned about. But it was his low back that tightened up on him. He just couldn’t go any more. The same with him; we’ll see where he’s at in the next 24 hours and decide where we’re at with him.
Still, the Rangers now have the advantage in the series, and they have to feel good about the possibility of giving the ball to Gray if things reach a Game 7. Evan Carter stayed hot, going 2-for-3 with a walk, and with two hard-hit balls, Lowe could finally be starting to warm up. All of the money that the Rangers spent on free agents looked very much worth it during Game 3.Seager, Semien, and Gray, all of whom signed with the team as free agents on December 1, 2021, provided the bulk of the production. Seager and Semien drove in all three runs, and Gray threw three innings of one-hit ball.
The bright spots are considerably dimmer for the Diamondbacks. Walker finally looked locked in, knocking a double and hitting two balls over 101 mph. Marte extended his record-breaking postseason hitting streak to 19 games on a somewhat questionable judgement call by the official scorer. Pham also stayed hot, going 2-for-4 and bringing his World Series batting average to .538. Pfaadt turned in a solid start in the biggest game of his career, but that doesn’t matter much if the team behind him can’t get a run across. They’ll need to win one of the next te=wo games at home in order to send the series back to Texas.
In the meantime, the whole of the baseball world will be holding its breath for news about García’s side.
