Dodgers ‘moderately concerned’ by Flaherty’s velocity drop

Los Angeles Dodgers right-hander Jack Flaherty experienced a drop in velocity during his last start, and his team noticed.

“Obviously everybody knows – the more velocity the better, usually – unless you’re going way below hitting speed,” pitching coach Mark Prior said Thursday, according to ESPN’s Alden Gonzalez. “Concern, yeah, because obviously he was pitching on regular rest and it was a little bit down. Can he pitch with it? Yeah. … I feel pretty confident that he can get back to where he was the other time.”

While Prior acknowledged he’s “moderately concerned” by the dip in pitch speed, he also stated the issue is not injury-related.

Flaherty attributed the issue to a timing problem in his delivery that he’s working on correcting. In Game 5 of the NLCS, his average velocity plummeted to 91.4 mph.

Flaherty, 29, has been the Dodgers de facto ace since he was acquired from the Detroit Tigers ahead of the trade deadline. He posted a 3.58 ERA and 4.16 FIP over 55 1/3 innings while making 10 starts down the stretch. But he was hit around a bit in three postseason starts, allowing 12 earned runs on 15 hits and seven walks while striking out eight over 15 1/3 innings.

Flaherty is slated to start Game 1 of the World Series against the New York Yankees at Dodger Stadium on Friday. He’ll go up against Gerrit Cole.

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