Earlier MLB FanHouse put together a stellar roundtable -- yeah, I'm biased, I know -- about the NLCS and we briefly discussed the Dodgers' closing situation. Since then, news broke that Takashi Saito will not be the Dodgers closer in this series. So that means they'll head into the NLCS against the Phillies with Jonathan Broxton as their man. This isn't huge news, because Saito struggled in Game 2 against the Cubs and Broxton was straight filthy when he took the hill.
The rest of the report, however, is big news. He may not even be on the Dodgers NLCS roster.
"There's a probably a good chance of that happening," Saito said. "I would never tell the team that I don't want to be on the roster. The decision is theirs. If they judge that I can't help the team in this series, I'm fine with that."
The Dodgers bullpen is deep and strong, but this is still a big blow to the back end. It moves everyone back one spot from where they're accustomed. Luckily for them, they dealt without Saito for about two months in the regular season.
Of course, the Phillies' offense is a ton more imposing than the Dodgers' meek NL West foes.
