Dodgers’ Jack Flaherty Expresses Calm Before Start of World Series – Field Level Media – Professional Sports Content Solutions

Jack Flaherty caps a tumultuous 15-month stretch in which he pitched for four teams by starting Game 1 of the World Series on Friday.

The Los Angeles Dodgers right-hander will start the Fall Classic against the New York Yankees.

Flaherty, 29, tries to look at it like another beginning.

“When you’re ready to go, there’s just another opponent out there and you just treat it like any other series or game,” he said. “Everything else stays the same. Everything in between stays the same. It’s just everything that changes on the outside.”

A lot has changed for Flaherty over the past two seasons. In his seventh year with the St. Louis Cardinals in 2023, he was traded to Baltimore on August 1 and eventually played for the Orioles in the playoffs.

In December, Flaherty signed a one-year, $14 million free agent contract with the Tigers. Detroit traded him to the Dodgers on July 30, and he has emerged as the best starter for an injury-riddled rotation in Los Angeles.

After going 6-2 with a 3.58 ERA in 10 regular-season starts for the Dodgers, he is 1-2 with a 7.04 ERA in three starts this postseason.

Now Flaherty, a Los Angeles area native, faces the Yankees in the most-played World Series game. The teams are fighting for the title for the twelfth time.

Flaherty appreciates the mystique of the Yankees, thinking back to a trip to Yankee Stadium as a child.

“It must have been August or something, but they were excited,” he said. “It’s just one of those scenes that you take in and enjoy the story of. Even at 12, you just absorb it and enjoy it.

“But I’m also 12 at the time. I think my brother is probably 8 at this point. We’re there enjoying baseball, and we’re just there to watch the game, eat something and hang out. This time it will be a different setting (for Games 3, 4 and 5).”

Assessing the matchup between the teams with the two best records in the majors this year, Flaherty said: “(You see) how deep this series is with talent and the guys and the names out there, it’s just as star-studded ..” as can be.”

–Field level media