World Series: Texas Rangers need Max Scherzer to pivot the series back to Texas

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Fox. 10/30/2023. World Series Game 3. 1-1. 8. 1-1. . 126. 7:03pm

The Texas Rangers and Arizona Diamondbacks resume the World Series on Monday night in Arizona with Max Scherzer facing rookie Brandon Pfaadt. Game three is typically a pivot point in any best-of-seven series. The stat says that when a series is tied 1-1 the winner of of game three wins the series 69% of the time. Tonight's game will give the winning team a massive edge in this World Series. For Texas, it will be up to Max Scherzer to give Texas not just length, but quality tonight. Max really needs to do these three things to give Texas a great chance to win.

What can Max Scherzer do to help Texas win game 3?

#1 First Pitch Strikes

Arizona lives on getting ahead in the count and hitting pitches in counts that are in their favor. Both Eovaldi and Montgomery did a fine job with throwing first pitch strikes to this lineup. Max has to continue that in game three. This Arizona lineup is not the Houston lineup, but they are still challenging in a much different way. Wheras Houston could bludgeon a team to death, Arizona is a team that is a death by a thousand cuts sort of lineup. They will single and double a team to death. That is exactly what we saw in game two when the Diamondbacks racked up 16 hits.

Eovaldi and Montgomery in their starts finished with a higher than 50% first strike rate. They had more success when they were getting ahead in the count rather than behind. If Max can do that he will have a similar amount of success as those two had and be able to keep Texas in the game into the late innings.

#2 Make adjustments every time through the order

The one constant in these first two games is that Arizona has gotten off to very slow starts in the first three innings. The second time through the order they have been on the attack. The second time through is when the Diamondbacks got to Eovaldi for multiple runs. The second time through the order is when the DIamondbacks got a home run and RBI single off of Montgomery in game two. Max has to be prepared for the second time through for Diamondbacks' hitters to be in swing mode from the time they step into the batters' box.

It will be on Max and Heim to change up their attack plan second and third time through the order. Keep the Arizona hitters' guessing. Max cannot attack these hitters the same way more than once. If anything pitch backwards the second time so that they are not sitting on a fastball first pitch. Use that aggression against them and find a way to get quick outs. It has been amazing to watch the process Arizona's hitters use to get better as the game goes along. They are excellent at finding a way to tack on runs in the middle innings.

#3 Embrace Arizona's small ball attempts

If Arizona wants to give up outs to move runners let them. Just make quality pitches after the sac bunts to keep those runners from scoring. Montgomery did an excellent job of that in game two when he allowed a leadoff runner in the third. Alek Thomas started with a single and was bunted to second by Evan Longoria. Montgomery made good pitches and got Perdomo to ground out and then Marte to fly out to end the threat.

Max's approach if a leadoff runner gets should be to pump fastballs into the zone and give them the sacrifice bunt. If Max tries to be perfect after that and pitches deep into a count it gives the runner on first more time to try and steal second. At that point a sac bunt then works to move the runner to third and a sac fly scores a run. Give them the sac bunt to second and then strand the runner there. If they are going to make the mistake of giving up an out let them and then pitch your game from that point forward.

#4 Pitch with the bulldog mentality that has defined his career.

Make no mistake about it that tonight's game three start is why Max was brought to Texas. Chris Young traded for him so that he could start important games like this. Max has been a real competitor throughout his career. He comes into this start with more postseason starts than anyone on either roster. This will be his fourth World Series start. It will be Max's 30th postseason start overall.

Max's previous World Series starts saw his team win two of the three starts. Detroit lost his game four start in 2012 against Bochy's San Francisco Giants. The Nationals won his two starts in 2019 against the Astros. The constants among those starts is that he pitched five or more innings and allowed three or fewer runs. That is the type of effort that Texas will need tonight.

The ideal scenario for Max and the Rangers is that Max pitches right at five innings, gives up just one or two runs, and is able to hand a lead of some sort over to his friends in the Rangers' bullpen. I would fully expect with Sborz having not pitched in this series that he would be good for at least two innings. Chapman for at least one, and then Leclerc for the ninth. If everything works out Texas will pick up an important game three win.

A Texas win accomplish two things. First, it will continue their postseason road winning streak and extend it to nine. Second, it will remove any pressure from games four and five. Texas will know that regardless of the results of those game that the series will at the worst head back to Arlington for game six and potentially game seven.

Tonight's game will give Texas or Arizona the momentum in this series heading into game four. Both teams are staring at a bullpen game for game four. I would rather be the team that has the series lead than be behind in the series.

Tonight's game will be at 7:03pm and it will be broadcast by Fox.

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