There is simply no way to deny it – Cardinals third baseman Matt Carpenter has the Dodgers’ number in the postseason. So how, then, do you pitch to him? The answer may not be as complicated as you think.

No, I’m not suggesting pitching around the 6′ 3″, 215-pound right-hand throwing / left-hand hitting Galveston, Texas native – although there may be a time and place for that, but as the Cardinals leadoff hitter, this is not a wise option when you’ve got guys named Matt Holliday, Matt Adams and Jhonny Peralta coming up behind him. As simple as it may sound, the best way to pitch to Carpenter (and to anyone else for that matter) is to stay off the middle of the plate.

Matt Carpenter had little trouble hitting Clayton Kershaw’s 93-MPH fastball over the right-center field fence. As you can see, the pitch was right over the middle of the plate. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

Carpenter, who is 4 for 8 (.500) with two doubles and two home runs through the first two games of the Division Series, is not Superman. In fact, during the regular season he hit .272 with eight home runs and 59 RBIs – good numbers but certainly not great numbers. But what’s even more amazing is that Carpenter hit only .231 (6 for 26) with one home run and one RBI against the Dodgers during the regular season. So how is it that Carpenter does so well against the Dodgers in the postseason? Maybe it’s not him; maybe it’s the pitches that he has been getting.

When you take a close look at each of Carpenter’s four hits thus far in the NLDS, you will see that all of them were on pitches left right over the middle of the plate, or “cookies” as former MLB manager and current DodgerTalk Radio host Kevin Kennedy calls them. Two were fastballs by Clayton Kershaw, one was a change-up by Zack Greinke and one was a sinker (that didn’t sink) by J.P. Howell. While there may be a science to pitching a ball in a desired specific location, there isn’t much science for a major league baseball player to hit a cookie that is right over the middle of the plate. If he can’t, he doesn’t belong in the big leagues.

Unfortunately for the Dodgers, they have emboldened Carpenter’s confidence to the point where he actually thinks he is a good hitter and once a guy has that kind of confidence he can be very dangerous – that’s the bad news. The good news is that there isn’t a Dodgers pitcher not named Clayton Kershaw that is more effective at “painting the corners” than left-hander Hyun-jin Ryu – especially with his new slider that he learned from (you guessed it) Clayton Kershaw. The big question is: Will Ryu be rusty after having not pitching for nearly a month?

According to Dodgers manager Don Mattingly, Ryu has a delivery that is “simple” and, as such, this shouldn’t be an issue for him. In fact, if you recall, when Ryu made his first start after returning from his first bout with shoulder irritation on May 21 against the Mets, he allowed only two runs on nine hits with one walk and nine strikeouts in six innings of work to pick up his fourth win of the season.

Ryu won his first outing after returning from the DL the last time he had shoulder irritation.
(Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

Although there are guys a lot smarter at this stuff that I, it’s probably safe to say that the scouting report on Carpenter is etched in catcher A.J. Ellis’s mind, and if Ryu (and those who follow him) can keep the ball off the middle, the Cardinals current hottest postseason hitter could become a non-factor.