Verlander, Scherzer: First showdown to be ‘fun’
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Bradford Doolittle, ESPN Staff Writer
ARLINGTON, Texas — As arguably the two best right-handed pitchers of their generation, the relationship between the Texas Rangers‘ Max Scherzer and the Houston Astros‘ Justin Verlander has taken many forms.
It also has evolved from some early career friction as young teammates with the Detroit Tigers, mostly thanks to their brief time as teammates with the New York Mets.
“Looking at each other now through a different lens,” Verlander said, “it’s two guys who, we do go about things differently, but there’s more than one way to be successful. I can’t speak for Max, but for myself, this time around, I think we had good conversations about the way he sees things, the way I see things and how that can be beneficial.”
In Detroit, the two future Hall of Famers were in competition with each other as well as opponents. They’ve also been on teams that competed against each other for playoff spots and championships. In New York, they were teammates again, but older and wiser.
On Wednesday, the relationship will take a form it never has before: opposing pitchers on the mound.
Hard as it is to believe, Scherzer and Verlander will go head-to-head for the first time in their careers when the Rangers and Astros play at Globe Life Field on Wednesday in the finale of a key three-game series.
“That’ll be fun,” Scherzer said. “First time facing him. My whole career, I’ve got to face all the best guys in the world and I’ve got to play with all the best guys in the world. So I got to play with [Verlander] for a while. Now it’s going to be fun to actually go up against him.”
The matchup would be compelling in any context, but there are extra layers. When the Mets’ season fizzled, New York dealt both pitchers at the trade deadline, sending them to cross-state rivals in the midst of a heated divisional and wild-card playoff race.
While their time together in New York was short, Verlander said it allowed their relationship to grow.
“A lot has been talked about our past,” Verlander said. “I think it was a bit blown out of proportion. But you know, there was some tension there. And I think we both decided to make an effort coming in to just move past that.”
Scherzer went 9-4 with a 4.01 ERA for the Mets; Verlander was 6-5 with a 3.15 ERA for New York before going back to the Astros, with whom he won a World Series last season.
“It was good to get back with him,” Scherzer said. “He’s obviously one of the great competitors of our time, so it was good to be back with him and really get a download of how he is as a pitcher, and how he’s evolved.
“The game has changed over the seven or eight years we were apart. It was good to get back with him and get inside his pitching mind and how he attacks hitters.”
The Rangers and Astros are locked in a three-way battle with the Seattle Mariners for supremacy in the AL West, with those clubs also battling the Toronto Blue Jays in the wild-card chase.
Yet even the pitchers’ future Hall of Fame managers can’t help but marvel at what they might see Wednesday.
“I’ve said this many times,” Rangers manager Bruce Bochy said. “I’ve got a great seat to watch some really great players play. To see matchups like this, I enjoy it, to see guys who have had tremendous careers like they’ve had and how competitive they are.”
In addition to managing Verlander with the Astros, Houston’s Dusty Baker was Scherzer’s skipper with the Washington Nationals for two seasons.
“[It’s a challenge] to continue to manage and not become a spectator,” Baker said. “They’re different but they’re similar in their determination and their competitiveness.”
You can’t blame the managers for being a little excited. The two aces rank in the top three of all major career categories among active pitchers. In strikeouts, they are 1-2, with Scherzer topping the list with 3,361 and Verlander just 50 back at 3,311.
A meeting between two pitchers this accomplished is a rare thing, especially in this era of reduced starting pitcher workloads. According to Elias, Verlander and Scherzer’s 467 combined career wins will be the most by opposing starters over the past 15 seasons. It will be the first time since CC Sabathia and Mark Buehrle squared off in 2015 that there has been a meeting of two starters with at last 200 career wins.
Only 11 pitchers have won at least three Cy Young Awards; two of them will square off on Wednesday.
“I think it’s exciting,” Verlander said. “It’s not too often in baseball anymore you get matchups between two guys who have had the careers like him and I have had. I think it’s exciting for baseball.”
Ohio State is finalizing a deal to make veteran NFL coach Matt Patricia the school’s new defensive coordinator, sources told ESPN on Wednesday.
The move to bring in Patricia comes with the corresponding internal promotion of secondary coach Tim Walton to the co-defensive coordinator role, sources said. Ohio State will also be promoting safeties coach Matt Guerrieri to pass-game coordinator, per sources.
Patricia comes to Ohio State to replace Jim Knowles, who left for Penn State‘s defensive coordinator job in the wake of the Buckeyes’ 2024 national title.
In Patricia, the Buckeyes get a veteran defensive playcaller who worked as the New England Patriots‘ defensive coordinator for six seasons from 2012 to 2017. He began calling defensive plays without the official title in 2010, which was a device Bill Belichick used to break in new coordinators and keep pressure off them.
He was the defensive coordinator for two of New England’s Super Bowl wins and was on staff as an offensive assistant for the Patriots’ 2004 Super Bowl title.
Patricia spent three seasons as the head coach of the Detroit Lions from 2018 to 2020, getting fired with a 13-29-1 record in his third season there.
Walton’s promotion comes after coming to Ohio State in 2022 from the NFL, where he coached for four teams from 2009 to 2021. That included a job as the Rams‘ defensive coordinator in 2013.
His new title is a nod to the strong secondary play at Ohio State under his watch, as the Buckeyes finished No. 3 in the country in passing yards allowed in 2024 and No. 1 in that category in 2023.
Guerrieri is a former co-defensive coordinator at Duke from 2018 to 2021 and was the co-defensive coordinator at Indiana in 2023.
They will all be charged with taking over an Ohio State defense that returns just three starters from a unit that finished No. 1 nationally in total defense and scoring defense. The eight departing starters, including the entire defensive line, project to get picked in the NFL draft this spring.
Ohio State does return high-end talent, including safety Caleb Downs, who projects as one of the top players in college football next year. Junior linebacker Sonny Styles will be another top prospect, and senior cornerback Davison Igbinosun earned honorable mention All-Big Ten honors.
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