LOS ANGELES — It turns out the cliche is a cliche because it’s true.
Good pitching beats good hitting.
The Dodgers proved as much with a stifling performance to shut down the Milwaukee Brewers in a four-game sweep in the National League Championship Series.
The Dodgers gave up just four runs in the series, and the Brewers hit .118.
“Since the beginning of time in baseball, when you have dominant pitching on the mound throwing 98 to 100 (mph), every guy and tremendous offspeed pitches, the command they showed – (catcher) Will Smith deserves a ton of credit,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said. “Yeah. I said it was dominant pitching. If you want to say our offense – I think most offenses would struggle.”
Brewers outfielder Christian Yelich took some responsibility for the offensive outage while also crediting the Dodgers.
“They pitched really well,” Yelich said. “We obviously have some guys not feeling their best at the plate, a couple at the same time, myself included. It’s unfortunate when those rough stretches happen at this time. You don’t want that to happen obviously. They have some great pitchers who had some awesome performances. You combine that with guys scuffling and it’s going to be tough to score runs and create offense.”
This was no ordinary offense that the Dodgers left flailing.
The Brewers won a major-league best 97 games during the regular season, and it was largely because they had one of the most disciplined, balanced lineups in the majors.
The Brewers were third in the majors in runs per game, second in batting average and second in on-base percentage.
They struck out just 20% of the time, which was the fourth-best rate in the majors, and they walked 9%, which was fifth-best.
Those numbers were the product of a major-league best chase rate. The Brewers swung at only 25% of pitches out of the strike zone.
All of that continued in their NL Division Series victory over the Chicago Cubs. The Brewers scored 22 runs in five games, hitting .250. They struck out 21% of the time and walked 10%.
But the Dodgers shut them down, with starters Blake Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow and Shohei Ohtani holding them to three runs in 28⅔ innings, an 0.94 ERA. The Brewers scored one run against the Dodgers’ bullpen.
The Dodgers struck out 31% of the Milwaukee hitters they faced, while walking just 8%.
What they did best was pound the strike zone, which didn’t allow the Brewers to work counts like they had hoped.
“It’s no secret that we’re maybe the most passive team in baseball,” Brewers outfielder Sal Frelick said before Game 4. “That’s part of our identity. To combat that, they’ve been filling up the zone.”
Getting ahead in the count allowed Dodgers pitchers to lure the Brewers into swings at pitches out of the zone. They chased 34% of pitches out of the zone in the series.
“To lay off one guy’s split is way different than to lay off another guy’s split,” Murphy said before Game 3. “Same spot in the zone. It’s four inches below. Same spot, but one guy’s has certain properties to it. And it’s thrown by Yamamoto, and it has different properties to it.
“So again, you give Yamamoto a chance to throw his best game. You look different than you do against Pitcher Z, who doesn’t have the same properties on that pitch.”
The Dodgers held Yelich to an .071 average. Frelick hit .071 also. Second baseman Brice Turang hit .067.
“Those guys did a great job,” Brewers first baseman Jake Bauers said. “They were focused. They were dialed in and we got beat.”