“It was amazing. I am pretty excited, guys are starting to smell the postseason, and you can see the intensity, the focus, and they played tonight like it was a postseason, and we got some good pitching performances.” Dave Roberts said that after the Dodgers’ win over the Mariners, the bullpen would win the division.  However, in Game 1 of the Wild Card against the Reds, the bullpen was anything but quiet.

The Dodgers were ahead 10–2 after Blake Snell pitched seven strong innings, giving up only two runs and striking out nine batters. But the eighth inning got heated when three relievers—Alex Vesia, Edgardo Henriquez, and Jack Dreyer—gave up three runs, walked four batters, loaded the bases twice, and forced Roberts to bring in Blake Treinen to put an end to the threat. Yes, the Dodgers won by 10-5, but the game felt closer than it should have been.

When questioned after the game, Roberts directly addressed the bullpen’s lapses: “Yeah, well, Alex wasn’t sharp tonight. And, you know, and obviously, Henriquez wasn’t, didn’t have any command. … At that point in time, you got to get somebody else to kind of stop the momentum. … I felt, you know, having Dreyer … was a good spot for him. … Ultimately, we got Ke-Brien to pop up.” The skipper went on and said he “felt good about where we were at to kind of shorten Alex a little bit … with that lane … I follow up … he just wasn’t good tonight.” Those remarks underscore the thin margin in letting a bullpen inning unravel.

That unease in relief is not new. The Dodgers have had trouble with their bullpen all season. In the regular season, their relief pitchers compiled a 4.27 ERA out of the bullpen. And the bullpen ranks as the second-worst of all the teams that made the playoffs. In fact, Clayton Kershaw actually pitched in the bullpen just a few days ago, his first time since 2019. He pitched a clean inning to try to help the struggling relief corps.

Tuesday’s game followed a similar script. Shohei Ohtani and Teoscar Hernandez each hit two home runs to keep the Dodgers ahead. But the relievers still couldn’t find the strike zone with an eight-run cushion. Three pitchers combined for three runs, four walks—two with the bases loaded—and 59 pitches just to record three outs in the eighth inning—a worrisome situation.

When pressed about whether his pitchers weren’t being aggressive enough, Roberts acknowledged the obvious: “That’s exactly right. It’s very clear to me when you’re on the attack, those guys are on their heels with the lead that we have. And then when you start being too fine and getting behind, you start giving them free bases. And that’s how you can build innings and get momentum.”

The bullpen woes weren’t Dave Roberts’ only concern. As the final innings unfolded, another problem emerged that could be another headache for the skipper.

Injury worry enters the mix for Dave Roberts

Even though the bullpen was unstable and could have stopped the momentum, one more problem came up at the end. Kike Hernandez left Game 1 with a strained back. He left at the bottom of the seventh inning after going 2-for-3 with a run scored. After the game, when asked about the injury update, Roberts mentioned, “He has some back tightness, so just, kind of, trying to take care of him in this particular game, getting him ready for tomorrow and beyond.” The manager further said, “But he’ll be in there tomorrow.”

Alex Call took his place in left field. Dave Roberts later said that the change was just a precaution and not a significant setback.

Hernandez’s role has evolved. His batting average has gone down, but his true value is in how flexible he is on defense, how well he makes contact, and how well he plays several positions. In around 232 at-bats, he’s hitting with an avg. of .203, an OPS of .621, along with 10 home runs and 35 RBIs.

The Dodgers thought that mix was good enough to sign him again in the offseason. So, they re-signed a one-year, $6.5 million deal. That commitment shows how much they appreciate his ability to hold things together, even when he’s not hitting much.

Dave Roberts downplayed Hernandez’s injury, but he can’t afford another problem right now. With the bullpen already shaky, losing a utility player who can fill multiple roles would stretch an already thin margin for error. And a small error in the postseason can shatter the World Series goal.