LOS ANGELES – Perfection was in the air for the Los Angeles Dodgers on Sunday. Perfection on the scoreboard, perfection for a hometown player living his dream and near-perfection for pretty much anyone throwing a baseball for LA right now

In a Game 1 loss full of history-making outs, Jack Flaherty and two relievers came together to beat the New York Mets 9-0 as the Dodgers picked up a series-opening victory in the NLCS.

“It was just a pitching clinic,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “I thought (Flaherty) did a great job of filling the strike zone with his complete mix. Used his fastball when he needed to. Just minimized the damage.”

With the whitewash, the Dodgers have extended a scoreless innings streak — one that began in Game 3 of the NLDS against the San Diego Padres — to 33 innings, tying the 1966 Baltimore Orioles for the longest in postseason history.

The Dodgers also became only the third team to record three consecutive shutouts in the postseason, joining the Orioles and the 1905 New York Giants.

Flaherty served the first seven of those goose eggs in Game 1, holding the Mets to two hits through seven innings and striking out six. It was the longest outing by a Dodgers starter in the postseason since Max Scherzer on October 11, 2021. Los Angeles, an October game, had twenty games between these two gems.

With the Dodgers’ rotation plagued by injuries, this was the kind of outing the team hoped for and desperately needed from Flaherty when it acquired him from the Detroit Tigers at the trade deadline.

“He has an aura about him,” Dodgers catcher Will Smith said. “He’s super competitive, super focused. I see all the preparation he does in the few days before the start. It’s intense.”

The evening was, well, perfect for Flaherty, an LA native who grew up as a Dodgers fan and attended many games at Dodger Stadium with his mother, who was there Sunday. Flaherty also pitched a shutout to win a state championship in high school in 2013.

In short, it was the kind of night that a kid who grows up as a fan of any team dreams of. Not only did Flaherty get to enjoy himself, but he did so with family and friends watching from the stands, including friends he played with in Little League.

“Man, those are the days, those are the best days we’ve had,” Flaherty said. “I still have my friends that I played with, I saw some of them in the stands. Just really cool. Really cool to have the support from all of them.”

For Flaherty, the night ended with him walking off the mound after ending the seventh inning to a rousing ovation from a group of fans – of which he used to be one. As intense as it was, the journey was not lost on Flaherty.

“Walking down the hill, I’ve usually been able to keep it together no matter what, even if it was the end of an outing,” Flaherty said. “Yes, it’s hard not to smile there.”

With Game 2 scheduled for Monday afternoon after a brief turnaround, Roberts confirmed that the Dodgers will go with a bullpen game, playing out a series of relievers in hopes of continuing the scoreless streak and returning to New York with a 2-0. pipe. That made Flaherty’s Game 1 performance, especially the length, that much more important.

“I felt good about that,” Roberts said. “For Jack to be able to do that opens up a lot of things, and also saves some looks (against Mets hitters) from some of our guys in the pen.”

Another allusion to perfection: For a fleeting moment, this was literally true of a Dodgers staff dominating at the most important time on the baseball calendar. When Flaherty allowed his first baserunner — a walk to New Yorker Francisco Lindor in the fourth inning — it snapped a streak of 28 straight batters the LA staff had retired, dating back to Game 5 against San Diego.

The records are coming so quickly for the Dodgers that they don’t even know when they will happen. The scoreless inning streak was matched thanks to a ninth pitched by rookie Ben Casparius, who had all three big league appearances to his credit when the playoffs began.

Casparius had no idea he was part of history until it was told to him after the match, but he seemed to realize its significance.

“It’s amazing,” said Casparius. “Especially since I’m a rookie and a guy who got here kind of late.”

The perfection extended to the Dodgers’ offense, which produced nine runs. And for a team that relies heavily on home runs to turn the scoreboard around, LA didn’t hit a ball over the fence on Sunday. The Dodgers hit just one extra base hit and even laid down a pair of sacrifice bunts.

For the Mets, who were playing in the 100th postseason game in franchise history, it marked their worst playoff loss ever.

With the blowout, the Dodgers have now scored 23 straight runs since their pitchers last allowed a run, two short of Atlanta’s postseason record in 1996. The team Flaherty just joined, but has spent his entire life on been on the right track.

“This game is fun,” Flaherty said. “This game is a lot of fun. I’ve been lucky to do it since I was a little kid. I’m still lucky to be able to do it today and be put in these positions.”

An ideal night in Chavez Ravine is in the books for the Dodgers. Yet it was still just one win, a fact the Dodgers didn’t lose — or the star of that dream come true.

“We have work to do,” Flaherty said. “It’s Game 1. It’s still a really good team there. We’ll enjoy tonight, but we have a quick turnaround tomorrow.”