The last scheduled day of the regular season will see all 15 games begin within 15 minutes of each other — a perfect setup to settle a pair of NL division races.
The Chicago Cubs and Milwaukee Brewers are tied atop the NL Central going into Game 162. Mike Montgomery (5-6, 3.99 ERA) starts for the Cubs vs. St. Louis at Wrigley Field, while the Brewers hadn’t announced their pitcher to take on the Tigers at Miller Park.
The Los Angeles Dodgers and Colorado Rockies are all even in the NL West. Walker Buehler (7-5, 2.76 ERA) was listed to pitch as the Dodgers visit San Francisco, trying to win their sixth straight division title. The Rockies, who’ve never finished in first place, face Washington at Coors Field.
The Cubs, Brewers, Dodgers and Rockies have all clinched playoff spots, but want to avoid wild-card peril. If the divisions are tied after Sunday, they’ll go to tiebreakers Monday at Wrigley Field and Dodger Stadium — the winner advances to the Division Series, the losers meet Tuesday in the one-and-done wild-card game.
The most interesting twist to the races has been Washington’s starting pitcher. Nationals manager Dave Martinez announced Saturday night that ace Max Scherzer will not start Sunday and instead right-hander Erick Fedde will face Colorado left-hander Tyler Anderson, an enormous break for the Rockies.
The Dodgers’ 10-6 win Saturday over the San Francisco Giants assured them of making the playoffs and factored heavily in the Nationals’ decision not to start Scherzer on regular rest Sunday.
He piled up 10 strikeouts, to boost his total for the season to 300, on Tuesday against Miami, working seven innings to increase his major league-leading total for the season to 220 1/3.
Martinez said the decision to start Fedde came after Martinez, general manager Mike Rizzo and Scherzer spoke Saturday.
Not surprisingly, the Rockies were glad to hear three-time Cy Young Award winner Scherzer (18-7, 2.53 ERA) won’t be starting Sunday.
“It’s great when you don’t have to face a four-time Cy Young (winner),” said Rockies third baseman Nolan Arenado, giving Scherzer credit for an additional Cy Young Award. “We were all ready to face him. He’s one of the best to ever do it, with (Los Angeles’ Clayton) Kershaw the best of our generation, really. The guy we’re facing, there’s not a lot of familiarity. I think his first big league start was (against) us in Washington.”
