The Dodgers will try to take a two-games-to-none lead when their National League Division Series against the Philadelphia Phillies resumes Monday in Philadelphia after an off day.
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In postseason history, teams taking a 2-0 lead in a best-of-5 series have gone on to win that series 80 of 90 times, 88.9%, according to Major League Baseball.
Blake Snell will pitch for the Dodgers while fellow left-hander Jesús Luzardo will pitch for the Phillies.
Snell was the winning pitcher in Game 1 of the Dodgers' wild card series against the Cincinnati Reds on Tuesday, allowing two runs and four hits over seven innings, striking out nine and walking one.
Snell was 5-4 with a 2.35 ERA in the regular season, with the Dodgers posting a 7-4 record in his 11 starts. The two-time Cy Young Award winner was on the injured list from April 6 to Aug. 2 due to left shoulder inflammation.
Snell had the best of his 11 2025 regular-season starts in his only appearance against Philadelphia, with 12 strikeouts in seven innings, both season highs, limiting the Phillies to two hits, matching his season low, in a 5-0 victory at Dodger Stadium on Sept. 17.
Snell is 1-3 lifetime against Philadelphia in seven starts with a 3.41 ERA.
Luzardo was 15-7 with a 3.92 ERA. The Phillies were 18-14 in his starts. Luzardo's 216 strikeouts were fourth in Major League Baseball and his 15 victories were tied for fifth. He was 1-1 with a 2.57 ERA against the Dodgers in 2025 and is 1-1 lifetime with a 3.12 ERA in five starts and one relief appearance against the Dodgers.
Shohei Ohtani is 2-for-14 for a .143 batting average against Luzardo with two home runs and two RBIs.
Ohtani was 0-for-4 with four strikeouts and a walk in Saturday's 5-3 Game 1 victory
Dodger manager Dave Roberts was asked in his Sunday news conference, "How did you see his swing last night?"
"I just thought that (Cristopher) Sanchez was really good with the sinker, with the change-up," Roberts said. "Then he faced (Matt) Strahm, who made some good pitches on him and got the walk.
"But I just thought that he was chasing out of the zone, and then when he was taking, he was taking strikes. It was kind of a bad combination, just a bad night. Expect him to be better in Game 2."
A decision on whether catcher Will Smith will be in the starting lineup won't come until "kind of late morning, once I hear from him and hear how he feels," Roberts said.
Smith pinch hit for Ben Rortvedt in the fifth inning Saturday, then remained in the game at catcher. The game was Smith's second since suffering what was later diagnosed as a hairline fracture in his right hand when he was hit by a foul tip Sept. 3 and first since Sept. 9 when his hand flared up the next day.
The three-time All-Star Game selection was 0-for-2 with two strikeouts and was hit by a pitch, scoring on Teoscar Hernández's three-run homer.
Roberts agreed with a questioner Sunday that "there could be some value in possibly Ben continuing to start some games and Will coming in to pinch-hit and then staying in to kind of manage the workload as he eases back into action."
"He hasn't had the normal buildup as far as getting his legs back and catching and all that kind of stuff that he normally would, coming back from an injury," Roberts said. "Then you layer in the intensity of the postseason, the games are a little bit longer. To have him catch four innings and then to potentially run that same playbook, certainly there's value to that.
"But if he says that he feels great, there's no remnants of Game 1, it might be hard for me not to kind of pencil him in. But certainly there's potential upside in having him catch four or five innings."
More will be known Monday on the availability of Philadelphia center fielder Harrison Bader, who was replaced by a pinch hitter in the seventh inning Saturday because of a groin injury, manager Rob Thomson said at his news conference Sunday.
"No major tear or strain," Thomson said. "He's going to come in this afternoon and get some treatment, and we'll know more tomorrow. I think after the game they stretched him out. They got him moving around a little bit, and I think he felt a lot better after that."
Major League Baseball issued the following statement in response to an email from City News Service asking about the Sunday off day: "There are competitive and broadcast considerations that are taken into account when building the postseason schedule. Last season American League clubs had the off day between Games 1 and 2 of the division series, and this year the National League clubs have this off day."
The 3:08 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time game will be televised on TBS, streamed on HBO Max, broadcast in English by KLAC-AM (570) and in Spanish by KTMZ-AM (1220).
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