Twenty-eight-year-old Dodgers right-hander Jack Flaherty (who turns 29 on Tuesday) was nothing short of sensational in Game-1 of the 2024 National League Championship Series in front of a sold out Dodger Stadium crowd of 53,503 on Sunday evening.

All the popular Burbank, CA native and first-round draft pick in 2014 by the St. Louis Cardinals out of Harvard-Westlake High School in Los Angeles did was toss 7.0 shutout innings against the NL East Champion New York Mets, allowing only two hits and two walks, while striking out six of the 24 Mets batters he faced. He retired the first nine Mets batters in order (four via strikeout) and finished his stellar performance on just 98 pitches (59 strikes) enroute the Dodgers 9-0 pounding of the (not so) Amazin’ Mets.

“It was just a pitching clinic. I thought he did a great job of filling up the strike zone with his complete mix. Used his fastball when he needed to just minimize damage,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of Flaherty postgame. “Once we caught a lead, he did a great job of just going after those guys and attacking, and for us to get seven innings in a long series was huge.”

The only real threat the Mets mounted against Flaherty came in the top of the fifth inning with consecutive singles by Mets designated hitter Jesse Winker and second baseman Jose Iglesias to leadoff the inning. But a stellar defensive play on Iglesias’ single by Dodgers center fielder Kiké Hernández to second baseman Gavin Lux to third baseman Max Muncy nailed Winker trying to take third on the play for the first out of the inning. Flaherty then got Mets center fielder Tyrone Taylor to fly out to Dodgers right fielder Mookie Betts and Mets catcher Francisco Alvarez to line out to Kiké to end the inning and the threat.

As for those nine Dodgers runs, two came in the bottom of the first inning on a one-out two-run single to center by Muncy, one in the bottom of the second on a single to right by designated hitter Shohei Ohtani, three in the bottom of the fourth on singles by Dodgers shortstop Tommy Edman and Ohtani, and three in the bottom of the eighth on a one-out bases loaded / bases clearing double to left by Betts to put the game out of reach for New York.

“We want to win, we’re gonna win a World Series. That’s our mindset, that’s our goal each and every time we step on the field, and we showed it tonight,” Betts told Fox Sports Ken Rosenthal following the Dodgers dominating win.

Play Ball!

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