Walker Buehler Continues Rise as Dodgers' Top Ace in NLDS Game 1

The Los Angeles Dodgers gave the first start of their 2019 postseason run not to Clayton Kershaw or Hyun-Jin Ryu, but to Walker Buehler.

Good call.

Buehler may not have Kershaw's three Cy Young Awards or Ryu's MLB-best 2.32 ERA, yet the 25-year-old's relative shortage of accolades was decidedly a non-factor in Game 1 of the National League Division Series on Thursday. He paced a 6-0 win over the Washington Nationals with one hit, three walks and eight strikeouts over six shutout innings.

Thus did Buehler out-pitch Nationals ace Patrick Corbin, and the Dodgers put the game away when Max Muncy roped a two-run single off Fernando Rodney in the seventh inning:

The Dodgers tacked on two more in the eighth via a pair of solo home runs, including one by rookie infielder Gavin Lux in his first-ever postseason at-bat.

The star of the evening, however, was certainly the right-hander who got it all started.

"If you know Walker, it's not surprising," said Dodgers third baseman Justin Turner, according to Ken Gurnick of MLB.com. "He's very, very, very, very, very confident in himself. He loves it. He thrives on these situations."

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Buehler owned the mound much like he did in his last playoff start, which was a history-making seven-inning performance in Game 3 of the 2018 World Series against the Boston Red Sox. Altogether, he's now pitched 13 shutout innings with three hits, three walks and 15 strikeouts in his last two October outings.

The time in between these two starts hasn't been too shabby either. Though Buehler posted "only" a 3.26 ERA over 182.1 innings in the 2019 regular season, each of his per-nine rates—10.6 strikeouts, 1.8 walks and 1.0 home runs—indicate he deserved better.

Buehler's sabermetric rabbit hole only deepens from there. For instance, a Statcast metric called xwOBA placed Buehler among the NL's most overpowering hurlers in 2019:

Just because neither Kershaw nor Ryu is present here doesn't mean either would have been the wrong pick to lead off the Dodgers' quest for a third straight World Series appearance. Ryu's ERA pretty much speaks for itself, and Kershaw pitched like his vintage self in the season's final three months.

But precisely what makes Buehler so special is plainly evident on nights like Thursday: When he's on, everything out of his hand is pure magic.

He threw 100 pitches against the Nationals, and they swung and missed at 18 of them. It's hard to blame them, given that they were seeing a fastball that peaked at 99.2 mph and sinkers, cutters, sliders and curveballs that darted this way and that.

Such stuff is typical of Buehler, who ranked fifth among qualified starters in average fastball velocity (96.6 mph) and third in average spin rate (2,586 RPM). And the degree to which he knows how to use his stuff is not to be understated.

"He really understands game-planning and all the analytics and information that gets thrown our way," Dodgers manager Dave Roberts told B/R's Leo Sepkowitz in June. "His intelligence, his curiosity, and you layer that on with the [pitch] mix and the arm—it's pretty special." 

These qualities were also on display in Game 1, as Buehler clearly knew what he wanted to do against Washington's right-handed and left-handed batters:

Images courtesy of BaseballSavant.MLB.com

Buehler effectively dared the righties to try to pull the ball by feeding them heat on the outer edge of the strike zone. Lefties mainly got heat up in the zone, where their natural uppercut swings are less effective.

It's little wonder that Nationals hitters couldn't do much against Buehler's fastball. And as he usually does, he only made things more difficult by mixing up his pitches as the game went along. To wit, it wasn't until his pitch count started getting close to the century mark that he started featuring his curveball.

As Rob Friedman can show, said curveball was in fine form:

This time last year, the Dodgers understandably led with Ryu and Kershaw in their playoff rotation. Buehler was limited to four appearances, missing out on a fifth when Boston clinched the World Series in five games.

Now that Buehler is front and center this time around, the Dodgers are trusting him to both get them started off on the right foot in a given series and, if needed, come back later to either keep it going or finish it off. This is, in effect, his first test as the true ace of their pitching staff.

Apropos of all the numbers referenced above, Buehler has earned this responsibility. And beyond the electric stuff, he has the right mindset for it. 

"I think for me it's just trying to get deep into games and put up zeros is still the biggest thing," he said of his postseason approach, according to Gurnick and Matt Kelly of MLB.com.

With six zeros and one win already in the bag, it's so far, so good for the Dodgers' new No. 1.

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference, FanGraphs, Baseball Savant and Brooks Baseball.