The Los Angeles Dodgers announced on Saturday that veteran right-hander Walker Buehler will start Game 3 of the World Series on Monday against the New York Yankees. The Dodgers must first play Game 2 on Saturday, just 24 hours after scoring a walk-off grand-slam victory to take a 1-0 lead in the best-of-seven series.
"I think it's just [that] we love Walker in big games," Dodgers manager Dave Roberts explained before Game 2. "The road isn't going to faze him. It also allows him potentially to be available for a Game 7, too."
Buehler, 30, endured a rough regular season. Across 16 starts, he amassed a 5.38 ERA (72 ERA+) and a 2.29 strikeout-to-walk ratio. Those marks left him on the wrong side of the replacement line, according to Baseball Reference's calculations. Nonetheless, Buehler did perform well in his start against the New York Mets during the National League Championship Series. He threw four shutout innings, allowing three hits and two walks but striking out six of the 18 batters he faced.
It's perhaps worth noting that Buehler's movement profile during the NLCS was different from his previous postseason appearance against the San Diego Padres, with his sweeper showing more horizontal break and both his four-seam fastball and cutter featuring more vertical life.
Buehler is an impending free agent who missed most of the 2022-23 seasons undergoing and then recovering from his second Tommy John surgery. For his career, he's compiled a 3.27 ERA (125 ERA+) and a 3.97 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 131 outings. He's a two-time All-Star who has twice received top-10 consideration for the National League Cy Young Award, first in 2019 and then again in 2021.
The Dodgers are starting Yoshinobu Yamamoto in Game 2 and run a bullpen operation in Game 4 before turning things back over to Jack Flaherty, their Game 1 starter, in Game 5.
