Roki Sasaki's request for change of plans shows he's in right mindset ahead of Dodgers playoff run

With the regular season winding down, the Los Angeles Dodgers have used bullpen days the last two games against the San Diego Padres and San Francisco Giants.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto was originally the probable starter for Tuesday's game against San Diego, but the Dodgers are planning out a schedule to manage Yamamoto, Tarik Skubal, Tyler Glasnow and Blake Snell, while also planning out their playoff rotation.

The back-up plan was to open with Roki Sasaki, who had missed almost a month due to a blister, but the youngster essentially re-wrote the lineup card.

“I said I wanted to pitch out of the bullpen,” Sasaki said per Dylan Hernandez of the New York Post. Rather than starting the game, Sasaki was inserted after a one inning each from Brock Stewart, Justin Wrobleski and Blake Treinen.

The 24-year-old righty pitched a scoreless fourth inning, and struck out two, but did allow two hits in his first outing since August 26th. It was Sasaki's first relief appearance since Game 6 of the World Series last year.

Dodgers' test run with Roki Sasaki was a success

Sasaki is clearly a prideful guy who wants to carve out a career as a starting pitcher. He was not thrilled about the move to the bullpen last season. Unlike many of his teammates, Sasaki isn't signed to a monster contract and likely wants to continue to start games in order to bank a large extension or free agency contract down the road. However, he's clearly in the right state of mind at the moment...perhaps unlike the Dodgers?

It's a little strange that the Dodgers were not planning to deploy Sasaki in relief of this game originally, right? He hadn't come out of the bullpen all season, and baseball players are as routine-oriented as human beings come. It's a little strange, but Sasaki clearly is locked in heading into October.

Sasaki appeared in nine postseason games last year. Sasaki has now appeared in 12 career games as a reliever including both the regular season and postseason, and the Dodgers are 12-0 in those games.

Sasaki has has a 0.66 ERA, 12:5 K:BB, and three saves in just over 13 innings of relief. The hopes are that a rejuvenated and healthy Sasaki can give this shaky, injury-riddled bullpen some stability before a possible three-peat.

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