If we were talking about the National League Championship Series in April, chances are most baseball fans would have told you the absolutely stacked Los Angeles Dodgers would be playing in it. The New York Mets, on the other hand, maybe not so much. On June 2, FanGraphs’ playoff odds for the Mets bottomed out at 7.9 percent.

But baseball will always be baseball, so here we are three games into the NLCS, with the Mets trailing the Dodgers two games to one.

It’s been a bit of a funny series so far, with the Dodgers blowing out the Mets in Games One and Three and the Mets returning the favor in Game Two. Although likely National League MVP candidate Shohei Ohtani stole the show in Game Three with a towering home run that looked like it was going to leave Citi Field (VIDEO), you might be surprised that by wRC+ both teams’ most impactful bat in the extreme small sample size is The big shot of the Postseason was Mets Jesse Winker, who posted a wRC+ of 201 in 21 plate appearances in October.

Winker was a trade deadline acquisition from the Nationals who is two-for-six with two walks and one run scored so far this NLCS.

There aren’t many former Cubs on these rosters, although close watchers of the team will remember the brief stint when Luis Torrens was a backup catcher for thirteen games with the 2023 team. The Dodgers’ roster does not include any players who spent time with the Cubs at the MLB level.

The much more familiar face on the Mets roster to Cubs fans is starting pitcher José Quintana, who appears to have reinvigorated himself in his age-35 season. Quintana threw 170 ¹⁄₃ innings to the tune of a 3.75 ERA this season. He has not yet given up a run after eleven innings this postseason and will start tonight in New York for Game Four. He was outstanding, striking out six Phillies last time out (VIDEO).

Honestly, perhaps the most stunning element of this game is the Mets starting rotation of Kodai Senga (who mostly pitches in an opener role after missing all but five innings of the regular season with an injury), Sean Manaea, Luis Severino and Quintana emerges to be well matched and perhaps even stronger than the Dodgers starting rotation of Jack Flaherty, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Walker Buehler and rookie Landon Knack (who has usually followed an opener).

Both teams have relied heavily on their bullpens early in this series, which could lead to an advantage for hitters who see the same things over and over again as the series progresses. We’ll find out more tonight in New York. Game 4 starts tonight at 7:08 PM CT.