Walker Buehler enjoyed a solid rookie season in 2018 that saw him make important playoff starts for the Los Angeles Dodgers. The right-hander’s first taste of the postseason came in Game 3 of the National League Division Series against the Atlanta Braves on the road.
Unfortunately for Buehler, it was an outing to forget as he allowed five runs in the second inning, including a grand slam to Ronald Acuña Jr. The blast sent the SunTrust Park crowd into a frenzy as the Braves went on to defeat the Dodgers by a final score of 6-5.
L.A. would go on to eliminate the Braves and advanced for an NL Championship Series matchup against the Milwaukee Brewers. Similar to the Dodgers’ first playoff matchup, they had to deal with a lively crowd at Miller Park.
Manny Machado was booed mercilessly by Brewers fans after he ran into Jesús Aguilar’s leg at first base in Game 4.
Largely due in part to those incidents, Buehler named Truist Park and American Family Field as two of the best playoff atmospheres, and also gave props to Wrigley Field, via the “Just Baseball” show:
“I always think back to my rookie year. That whole kind of playoffs, in Atlanta, gave up the grand slam to Acuña and you could feel it then. Milwaukee, we had all the stuff with Machado, he stepped on Aguilar’s foot, and Milwaukee got really interesting there. That’s just an interesting stadium in general. They’re cooking the sausages, it smells and it just had a weird thing with the dome. But the weird thing with Milwaukee is it’s almost got like a haze in there. Like if you go into an old bar, and there’s smoke in there from 30 years ago That feeling is what Milwaukee has a little bit sometimes. So those are probably the two that kind of struck me first in my career. Knew Atlanta with the lights and chop and all that stuff, there’s definitely an atmosphere there. Wrigley at night is kind of always like that as well, especially since they try and schedule us on the weekends and it’s always a big series. There were a lot of guys that played against them in the playoffs before I got there, so that place always has a little something to it.”
While Buehler was unable to participate in the postseason this year due to his recovery from Tommy John surgery, he still got to take in the energetic crowd at Dodger Stadium. Games 1 and 2 of the NLDS had attendances of over 51,000.
Walker Buehler shares perspective of Diamondbacks sweeping Dodgers in NLDS
Buehler believes the youthful Diamondbacks roster got the best of the Dodgers in the NLDS, and cited Arizona’s starting pitchers as being key to their success this season.
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