The Boston Red Sox 2018 World Series championship team has recently been the subject of reexamination following the shocking trade of Rafael Devers.
Winners of 108 games that season, the 2018 Red Sox will go down as one of the greatest teams in franchise history. And when it came time to shut the door on other teams during the postseason that year, the Red Sox weren’t afraid to send starters such as Chris Sale and Nathan Eovaldi into the game at any time.
As the architect behind the Red Sox title that year, Dave Dombrowski believes he can use that strategy again in the postseason with the Philadelphia Phillies. Appearing on the Starkville podcast hosted by Jayson Stark of The Athletic, Dombrowski spoke about how he plans to use his pitching staff if the Phillies advance to the postseason.
“The postseason bullpen is a lot different than the regular-season bullpen,” said Dombrowski. “Because in the National League this year, if you advance past the wild card round, you play five games (in the NLDS). Well, the way the schedule is (with an extra off day), you only need three starting pitchers during that time period.”
His Phillies recently suffered a major loss when left-handed closer José Alvarado was suspended 80 games for violating Major League Baseball’s ban on performance-enhancing drugs. As a result, Alvarado is not eligible to pitch in the postseason. That circumstance has Dombrowski willing to revisit what worked during the Red Sox 2018 title run.
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“A good example is ’18 when I was in Boston. Alex Cora was our manager, and he did a masterful job of working our starters into our bullpen and using some of them at times in the ’pen.”
Red Sox fans fondly remember Eovaldi’s six innings of relief against the Los Angeles Dodgers during the World Series that year, which allowed the team to rest its bullpen, and eventually played a role in Boston winning its fourth title since 2004.
The Red Sox will play a three-game series against the Phillies starting July 21.
