The Rangers rely on multiple starters and seem to have an easier path than the Diamondbacks who will rely on a bullpen game in Game 4.
If there's one thing the Texas Rangers have shown during their October run, it's that starting pitching depth is no longer just for the regular season. And in Game 4, we might find out if that statement will become a new maxim for October baseball.
In one of the most important games of their respective seasons, the Rangers and the Diamondbacks will turn to a bullpen game, but there's a marked difference in what Texas manager Bruce Bochy and his counterpart Torey Lovullo have to work with. While the Diamondbacks have a fairly standard playoff pitching staff that features many relievers, the Rangers have an unusually constructed pitching staff. They have eight pitchers on the roster who started at least eight games during the regular season.
At this point in the postseason, Bochy has called upon all of them, but Game 4 will be a different kind of challenge, especially after Game 3 provided a fairly revealing preview thanks to the effort of Jon Gray, who entered in the fourth after Max Scherzer's back tightened. Gray was hired to be the stopgap, and he threw three scoreless innings.
"Jon Gray came in and did a great job for us," Scherzer said. "Man, he really saved us. He pitched really well."
Despite Scherzer's early exit (and remember, after making only 36 pitches, he'd been in line to go at least into the middle innings), Gray's outing created a pristine bridge to the back end of Bruce Bochy's bullpen. Josh Sborz, Aroldis Chapman, and Jose Leclerc finished the game, each pitching one inning and throwing exactly 16 pitches apiece.
The length of Gray's outing essentially turned Game 3 into an unplanned bullpen game, and it worked to perfection. But with another game quickly approaching, and another one after that, what does a postseason manager, even one as experienced as Bochy, do now?