{"id":281640,"date":"2025-10-06T12:02:20","date_gmt":"2025-10-06T12:02:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/281640\/"},"modified":"2025-10-06T12:02:20","modified_gmt":"2025-10-06T12:02:20","slug":"clayton-kershaw-shares-something-in-common-with-greg-maddux","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/281640\/","title":{"rendered":"Clayton Kershaw shares something in common with Greg Maddux"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

PHILADELPHIA\u00a0\u2014\u00a0As Clayton Kershaw<\/a> completed his pregame routine the other day and walked off the field at Citizens Bank Park, I asked him about his postseason debut. That was 17 years and 39 playoff appearances ago, and yet Kershaw remembered it so well that he got his answer out before I got all of my question out.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was in the \u2018pen,\u201d Kershaw said. \u201cHere.\u201d<\/p>\n

The pitching staff of the 2008 Dodgers featured two Hall of Famers: Kershaw, in his first year, and Greg Maddux<\/a>, in his last year.<\/p>\n

When the Dodgers<\/a> faced the Philadelphia Phillies in the National League Championship Series, Derek Lowe, Hiroki Kuroda and Chad Billingsley made the cut as starters. Kershaw and Maddux did not.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe and I were both kind of the long guys down there,\u201d Kershaw said. \u201cIt\u2019s crazy, kind of the similarities.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere I am now is kind of where he was. It\u2019s pretty cool.\u201d<\/p>\n

For just about every player, baseball tells you when your career is over. Maddux, for all his accolades, was no exception.<\/p>\n

In each of his last five seasons, his earned-run average was above 4.00, even as he pitched at least 194 innings in each of them. In his last stint with the Dodgers \u2014 seven starts at the end of the 2008 season \u2014 his ERA was 5.09.<\/p>\n

Maddux knew that postseason would be the end for him. He just didn\u2019t tell anyone.<\/p>\n

\"Greg <\/p>\n

Greg Maddux pitches for the Dodgers against the San Francisco Giants at Dodger Stadium on Sept. 19, 2008.<\/p>\n

(Lisa Blumenfeld \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

In his last outing \u2014 in the game in which the Phillies eliminated the Dodgers<\/a> \u2014 Maddux was one of six Dodgers relievers. He worked the fourth and fifth innings, left the mound with the Dodgers down by five runs, and quietly asked the plate umpire for a baseball on his way out.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got the ball in my room somewhere,\u201d Maddux told The Times<\/a> in 2014. \u201cIt kind of stunk that we lost. But I knew it was the last time I was going to put on a uniform. I was privileged to wear it for as long as I did.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kershaw is the rare player that has told baseball when his career is over. He announced his retirement last month, effective at the end of the season, even as he is still mighty effective.<\/p>\n

His .846 winning percentage would have led the major leagues, had he thrown another 50 innings. He still threw more innings than anyone on the Dodgers except Yoshinobu Yamamoto<\/a>, and his 3.36 ERA was his third-worst in a full season. In his final start, he shut out the American League West champion Seattle Mariners into the sixth inning.<\/p>\n

In a normal year for the Dodgers, Kershaw would be starting in the playoffs, because a normal year for the Dodgers means scooping up a bunch of talented pitchers with histories of injury and questions of durability, then crossing their fingers and hoping a few are healthy and effective come playoff time.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

Last October, the Dodgers ran short: Yamamoto, Jack Flaherty<\/a>, Walker Buehler<\/a> and four bullpen games. This October, almost miraculously, the Dodgers have five available starters with an ERA better than Kershaw: Yamamoto, Blake Snell<\/a>, Shohei Ohtani<\/a>, Tyler Glasnow<\/a> and Emmet Sheehan<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Andrew Friedman<\/a>, the Dodgers\u2019 president of baseball operations, admitted to some trepidation at telling a Hall of Famer that he would be bound for the postseason bullpen.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut, to Kersh\u2019s credit, he cuts off that timidness in a way by saying, \u2018Hey, I\u2019m here to win, whatever it takes,\u2019\u201d Friedman said. \u201cHe\u2019s loved watching these guys compete. Obviously he\u2019s done really well this year as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cUsually, when a guy\u2019s on his way out, it\u2019s like, \u2018OK, it\u2019s time.\u2019 You can kind of see it. The performance really backs up. That\u2019s not the case with Kersh. He was a big part of the success we had this year. But to his credit, he cut it off really early and just said, \u2018Hey, I just want to be part of this and help this team win, whatever way I can.\u2019 And so he helped make that conversation way easier.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Dodgers <\/p>\n

Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw celebrates after getting San Francisco\u2019s Jerar Encarnacion to hit into a double play at Dodger Stadium on Sept. 19.<\/p>\n

(Gina Ferazzi \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n

If Kershaw works four innings this October, he\u2019ll pass Maddux for sixth place on the all-time list of postseason innings pitched. If he pitches 5\u2154 innings, he\u2019ll become the fifth pitcher to throw 200 postseason innings, joining Andy Pettitte, Justin Verlander, Tom Glavine and John Smoltz.<\/p>\n

In the future, fans will flip over Kershaw\u2019s baseball card \u2014 or, more likely, look up his Baseball Reference page \u2014 and learn that the greatest starter of his generation finished his career in relief.<\/p>\n

A curiosity, at the least, I suggested. Kershaw shrugged.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe postseason is just its own separate thing,\u201d he said. \u201cYou just do whatever you can. Where our team is at with our starters, it makes sense.<\/p>\n

\u201cI guess it\u2019s weird, but it\u2019s part of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

In his postseason debut<\/a> here in 2008, Kershaw retired the first five batters, not bad when four of them were named Jimmy Rollins, Shane Victorino, Chase Utley and Ryan Howard. In his finale in that 2008 NLCS, Maddux got the last man he faced to ground out: Cole Hamels \u2014 in the old days, when pitchers used to bat.<\/p>\n

Kershaw might not throw another pitch; the Dodgers have made no commitment to use him in this round, or to keep him on the roster if they advance beyond then.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, I asked Dodgers manager Dave Roberts<\/a> whether Kershaw was here only in case a starter exited in a hurry or a game went into extra innings.<\/p>\n

\u201cI trust him,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cI think there\u2019s other opportunities he might have to pitch. But I also do feel that there\u2019s other guys, whether it\u2019s lanes or spots, that I feel we\u2019re more comfortable with.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a slight on Clayton, but I do think that there\u2019s various roles \u2014 up, down, early, late \u2014 that I could use him.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Dodgers are using starters wherever they can: starting, relieving, closing. Given the anxiety-inducing state of the Dodgers bullpen, the notion that they might not be able to find a spot to use Kershaw leaves only one question: Seriously?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHILADELPHIA\u00a0\u2014\u00a0As Clayton Kershaw completed his pregame routine the other day and walked off the field at Citizens Bank…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":281641,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[591,145395,1582,276,2563,7480,145392,145394,61961,3688,28445,2961,145393,224,5337,5950,28211,14164,1628,20410],"class_list":{"0":"post-281640","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-big-part","10":"tag-ca","11":"tag-california","12":"tag-career","13":"tag-clayton-kershaw","14":"tag-dodgers-bullpen","15":"tag-first-hall","16":"tag-greg-maddux","17":"tag-inning","18":"tag-kershaw","19":"tag-la","20":"tag-last-october","21":"tag-los-angeles","22":"tag-losangeles","23":"tag-season","24":"tag-starter","25":"tag-way","26":"tag-year","27":"tag-yoshinobu-yamamoto"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115327123578387403","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=281640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281640\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/281641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=281640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=281640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=281640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}