The Los Angeles Dodgers are handing the ball to Eric Lauer on Tuesday, Sept. 1, when they open a three-game series against the Cardinals. He will start the opener against Michael McGreevy after returning to the starting rotation following Roki Sasaki's injury.
The move gives the Dodgers a defined first-game plan at a time when they are trying to balance a six-man rotation and the roster expansion that comes Tuesday. Will Smith will be added when rosters expand, and the club can keep the six-man setup because the teams have Monday off before the series begins.
Lauer, who was moved to the bullpen last weekend before moving back into the rotation, last pitched on Aug. 26 and worked two innings in relief. He has a 3.78 ERA across 69 innings with the Dodgers this season, enough for the club to trust him again in a game that matters even with a 9.5-game lead in the National League West.
That lead has not changed the bigger picture. The Dodgers are 82-55, but they are still sitting as the No. 3 seed in the National League behind the Milwaukee Brewers and Atlanta Braves, which makes every rotation decision in September part of the larger seeding race. The Cardinals come in at 68-70, 3-7 over their last 10 games and five games back of the Arizona Diamondbacks for the final wild-card spot.
The matchup also carries a little memory. The Dodgers and Cardinals already met from May 1-3, and St. Louis took two of three games in that series. That is the kind of result that keeps a team from treating an early-September opener as a formality, even when the standings say one club has far more room to breathe than the other.
For Lauer, Tuesday is less a spot start than a test of how long he can hold the rotation job after Sasaki's injury opened the door. The Dodgers have already shown they are willing to shift him back and forth, and the next answer arrives fast: first pitch against McGreevy, with the rotation and roster both changing in the same week.
