Jack Flaherty's Dodgers debut completely justified trade deadline risk

Jack Flaherty's Dodgers debut couldn't have come at a better time for LA, and it quickly confirmed that their trade for the right-hander represented the team's best (and boldest) move of the trade deadline by far.

The Dodgers suffered a tough loss to the Athletics on Friday despite putting up three runs in the ninth, enraging a fan base that had just watched their team get swept by the Padres in a two-game series earlier in the week. But Flaherty swooped in to be the hero the Dodgers needed on Saturday. He pitched his first quality start as a Dodger and 12th of the season, going six innings and only giving up five hits and no runs to bring his already great ERA down by 10 points to 2.80.

The Dodgers lineup rallied around him as well; LA's hitters put up 10 runs to the A's zero, Shohei Ohtani reached the first 30-30 season of his career and stole three bases that night, and Kiké Hernández became the first player in the modern era to get 3+ hits and close a game in a shutout.

Jack Flaherty pitched six excellent innings in his Dodgers debut

The Yankees made some noise after losing out on Flaherty at the deadline, saying that they eventually backed out of a trade because of injury concerns, referring to some back tightness that Flaherty received injections to treat while he was with the Tigers. This was a thin excuse from the start, as Flaherty only missed a couple of starts and never went onto the IL because of the issue -- which was also well-documented for weeks, if not months, ahead of the deadline.

However, if it gave any Dodgers fans pause about how Flaherty might perform when he got to LA, he quickly shut those concerns down. He even got out of a sticky situation in the bottom of the sixth, when the bases were loaded on an error from Cavan Biggio, a single, and a walk with no outs. The righty then got Shea Langeliers to ground into a play at the plate, struck out Seth Brown on a nasty curveball, then induced Abraham Toro to ground out to escape the jam.

Flaherty, an LA native, probably couldn't have asked for a better debut performance for his hometown team. The Dodgers return to LA for two series against the Phillies and Pirates starting on Monday, during which time Flaherty is sure to get his real hometown debut and keep proving that he's turned into one of the best pitchers in baseball this season.