Zack Wheeler and Zac Gallen are the two aces of these teams, but Merrill Kelly and Aaron Nola are about as good of #2s as you can have. They have had incredible postseasons, and both were great in the regular season.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!Aaron Nola finished this season with an ERA of 4.46, the highest ERA the D-backs have seen this postseason, but Nola has been great in the postseason. He has only allowed two runs this postseason and only allowed 14 runs in the postseason last year. He, like Wheeler, is dominant at Citizens Bank Park.
In his only start versus the Diamondbacks, Nola allowed four earned runs in 6.2 innings pitched and nine strikeouts. That’s a good amount of runs, but he was generating a lot of swings and misses. In game 1, Wheeler got the D-backs to swing at many terrible pitches. So, if they can’t generate contact with Nola, they will be in trouble.
As for Kelly, he had an incredible 3.29 ERA this season and had 189 strikeouts in 177 innings. In his only start in the postseason, Kelly had an impressive 6.1-inning shutout.
He allowed three earned runs in six innings in his only start versus Philadelphia. He had seven strikeouts.
Kelly, however, is from Philly but said some things about Citizens Bank pre-game that have Philly fans coming at his neck. He will not have favorable circumstances in Game 2 tonight.
Trea Turner fires back at Merrill Kelly following comments on crowd noises
