Blake Snell justified Dodgers' faith with one ridiculous off-balance Bryce Harper AB

Through the first two games of the NLDS, the top of the Phillies' order — Trea Turner, Kyle Schwarber, and Bryce Harper — went 2-for-21 against Dodgers' pitching. They struck out five times against Shohei Ohtani in Game 1 and four times against Blake Snell in Game 2.

Snell's last K of his six-inning, one-hit outing against Philadelphia was on Harper — whose thumb he infamously almost broke in 2022 on a fastball that got away from him — and it was a doozy.

Snell didn't opt for fastballs at all this time around. Instead, he threw him five sliders and single curveball, all on the outer third of the plate or outside of the zone. Outside of a first-pitch slider in the dirt, he was just working Harper further and further down and to the left, until he finally finished him off on another low and away slider.

Snell had gotten himself into a little trouble in the sixth (what turned out to be his last inning), when he allowed two walks with one out. But Dave Roberts left him out there to make or break the start himself, and he took Harper down on that swinging strikeout before Miguel Rojas made a terrific diving play at third to get lead runner Trea Turner on the force out.

Blake Snell's gutsy K on Bryce Harper seals another dominant playoff start for Dodgers

Harper was 2-for-13 against Snell with six strikeouts in his career going into Game 2, so it was already clear that Snell is a pitcher that Harper just can't figure out, but that hopeless swing to end the at-bat put a much finer point on it.

Snell allowed just a single hit through six — a single to Edmundo Sosa in the bottom of the fifth with two outs — but otherwise the Phillies had to wait until they saw Emmet Sheehan in his second inning to get their second and third hits (and first run). After that, Blake Treinen (and Alex Vesia, to a lesser extent) almost blew the whole thing in the bottom of the ninth, but Roki Sasaki and Freddie Freeman bailed them out, and the Dodgers gave themselves a commanding two-game lead thanks to a four-run rally in the seventh.

With that start, Snell has 13 innings postseason innings with the Dodgers under his belt, accompanied by a 1.38 ERA, 18 strikeouts, and .116 batting average against. He and Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who is lined up for the start in the potentially series-winning Game 3 at home at Dodger Stadium on Wednesday, are basically untouchable thus far.