Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers begin their 2025 postseason today, welcoming the 3-seed Atlanta Braves to LA for a best-of-five series. The Dodgers earned the first-round bye with a 100-62 record, winning the NL West by nine games and finishing six ahead of Atlanta. They were three back of Milwaukee, so if the higher seeds win, the NLCS will begin in Milwaukee a week from tomorrow. To get there, they’ll have to get past an Atlanta team that took down the Phillies in the Wild Card round and won five of six games against the Dodgers in the regular season. I wrote way too many words breaking down the series yesterday, but Game 1 kicks off today in potential 100 degree weather. Tarik Skubal gets the Game 1 nod for the Dodgers, and Dylan Dodd starts a bullpen game for Atlanta.
 |  | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1:00 P.M. | Los Angeles | ||
| DH | Baldwin (L) | SS | Betts |
| RF | Acuña Jr. | DH | Ohtani (L) |
| 2B | Albies (S) | C | Smith |
| 1B | Olson (L) | 1B | Freeman (L) |
| CF | Harris II (L) | LF | T. Hernández |
| LF | Dubón | RF | Tucker (L) |
| 3B | Riley | CF | Pages |
| C | Murphy | 3B | Muncy (L) |
| SS | Kim | 2B | Edman (S) |
| P | Dodd (L) | P | Skubal (L) |
The Dodgers traded for Skubal to be the anchor, and he’ll get the nod in Game 1 of the NLDS. Skubal had a down year by his standards, posting a 2.72 in 26 starts (16 with the Tigers, 10 with the Dodgers). He was slightly better as a Dodger, with a 2.61 ERA/2.36 FIP in 62 innings over those 10 starts. Skubal was mostly good with the Dodgers but did struggle at home, with a 3.75 ERA and .715 OPS allowed in his six starts at Dodger Stadium. Skubal turned in a pair of dominant starts in September, the first coming in Cincinnati and the second coming in his final start of the season in San Francsico. He got through seven shutout innings and allowed three hits in both starts with 19 strikeouts over the two games. Skubal’s start in SF felt like it would have been a Maddux, as he needed only 75 pitches to get through those seven innings. Those games against the Giants weren’t the highest-intensity games of the season, but it was still a dominant start heading into his first Dodger postseason. Skubal faced Atlanta back in April as a Tiger and allowed two runs over seven innings, but took a no-decision after Kenley Jansen blew a save.
The Tigers made the playoffs in each of the last two seasons and won their Wild Card rounds, but were bounced in the ALDS both times. Skubal’s first two playoff starts were dominant, as he didn’t allow a run over 13 innings in the 2024 Wild Card Game 1 and ALDS Game 2. Detroit brought him back for Game 5 of the ALDS and that one didn’t go well, as Cleveland tagged him for five runs and six hits in six innings in the decisive game. Skubal pitched three times last postseason as well and was overall better, allowing four runs on 10 hits in 20 2/3 innings with 36 strikeouts and only four walks. The Tigers lost two of those games, including the elimination ALDS Game 5. This will be Skubal’s first postseason start at his home stadium.
Atlanta went with an all-hands-on-deck approach to get past the Phillies, so their rotation is in a rough spot entering the series. Chris Sale pitched twice against the Phillies (including on Thursday) and Grant Holmes also pitched Thursday, so their options were throwing Tyler Mahle on short rest (he went seven innings Wednesday) or a bullpen game. They’re going for a bullpen game, with the lefty Dodd getting the start. Dodd only pitched once against the Phillies and got two outs in the eighth inning on Thursday before being replaced by Sale. He gave up a leadoff triple and a sac fly to shrink Atlanta’s lead to 6-2 and then got Kyle Schwarber to fly out before being pulled. Dodd had an excellent season with a 2.54 ERA in 49 2/3 innings and 53 strikeouts to 14 walks. Dodd pitched twice against the Dodgers back in August and allowed a hit over 1 1/3 scoreless innings. On August 25, Dodd came in to a tie game with two runners on and two outs in the eighth inning and got Miguel Rojas to fly out, which set up a game winning Ozzie Albies single in the bottom of the inning. He came back out the next game with Atlanta trailing 4-3 in the sixth and gave up a single to Teoscar Hernandez but got three flyouts to keep the game within one.
With a lefty on the bump for Atlanta, Mookie Betts leads off with Shohei Ohtani hitting second. Mookie led off nine times this season and posted a .324/.406/.784 triple slash hitting first in the order.
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The Dodgers announced their NLDS roster this morning.
Here’s your 26-man roster for the NLDS. pic.twitter.com/QwAi3MnYUx
— Los Angeles Dodgers (@Dodgers) October 3, 2026
A few surprises. Josue De Paula made the cut (it’s funny to me they listed him as an outfielder) as the left-handed bat off the bench and Hyeseong Kim made the roster in the Justin Dean pinch-runner role. Edgardo Henriquez also made the roster after missing the last couple weeks of the season with a back issue. Alex Call is off the roster on the offensive side (as is Dalton Rushing, but that’s not super surprising) and the Dodgers opted to not take Jack Dreyer or Justin Wrobleski in the bullpen. Atlanta struggles against left-handed pitching, but the Dodgers will have two lefty starters in the first two games and Tanner Scott, Alex Vesia and Kris Bubic in the bullpen.
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The Dodgers announced that Blake Snell will get the Game 2 start tomorrow.
Your NLDS Game 2 starter, Blake Snell. pic.twitter.com/70zjvhbXMT
— Los Angeles Dodgers (@Dodgers) October 3, 2026
Snell gets the ball at home which basically guarantees that Yoshinobu Yamamoto gets the ball Tuesday in Atlanta for Game 3. Yamamoto wasn’t quite as dominant at home this season and is a much safer bet to go deeper in a game than Snell, who can get a bit nibbly and run his pitch count up. Starting Snell the day before an off day makes sense.
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First pitch is scheduled for 1:00 PM PT and will be on FOX.
