LOS ANGELES — That popular mural of Joe Kelly on the reserve level of Dodger Stadium appears to guard a secret.
In front of a blue background, Kelly is wearing a mariachi jacket, the one he famously sported at the White House in 2021 to celebrate the World Series title from a year earlier. The fashion choice added to his lore as a man of the people among fans.
But Kelly also is wearing something else in that mural of spray paint on stucco that represents a year of change for the hard-throwing reliever.
Perhaps inadvertent, the likeness also shows Kelly with a half smile, somewhere between happy and pensive. Glad to be there, with something else on his mind.
Back last week from 18 days away because of shoulder inflammation, Kelly said this return to the roster is actually three full years in the making. In knocking out his most recent stiff shoulder, Kelly said a range of motion has returned that he hasn’t experienced in years.
“I just feel good enough to where I can throw with my old mechanics,” Kelly said after multiple years of resorting to alternate approaches and varying arm slots to compensate for discomfort.
He says those mechanics from 2021 are mostly intact now, save some miniscule variations for somebody with 13 seasons and nearly 500 games of mileage. In that 2021 season, Kelly went 2-0 with the Dodgers and had a 2.86 ERA in 48 appearances.
But as that postseason arrived, his sharpness was in decline. He gave up a run in two National League Division Series appearances and was on a run of four consecutive playoff appearances without giving up a run when he served as the opener for Game 5 of the NL Championship Series against the Atlanta Braves.
Kelly gave up a two-run home run to current teammate Freddie Freeman and never made it out of the first inning before the Dodgers’ offense rattled off 11 runs for the victory on three Chris Taylor home runs. The Braves advanced two days later.
Kelly departed on a two-year, $17 million deal with the Chicago White Sox to start the 2022 season, but he never felt completely healthy, even as he returned to the Dodgers in a 2023 trade. At the start of this season’s one-year, $8 million deal, he showed flashes of his former self, but only now is convinced he can have repeatable mechanics.
“Obviously, it’s not like I’ve been doing it for as long as I did when I was healthy, but, yeah there’s glimpses of that (old form) and my misses are a lot less,” Kelly said of being better able to harness the run he puts on his two-seam fastball, while having more command of his four-seamer.
While yearning to get back to this point, the past three years played out as something of a nightmare, even as Kelly had a 1.74 ERA in 11 outings for the Dodgers last year and had a 1.80 ERA in six July appearances this season following a return from a right posterior shoulder strain.
Those were just brief respites in the struggle that has him sitting on a 4.99 ERA this season.
“It’s something that I just thought, ‘It’s going to be the rest of my career this way,’” Kelly said. “Just play through pain and lose sleep. It was – you can ask my wife – it was a mess. It wasn’t fun, that’s for sure.”
Now, at least, there are prospects for more fun, even as the grind continues. With his new/old mechanics intact, Kelly had a scoreless appearance in Miami on Wednesday, but he found himself in a mess of trouble against the Colorado Rockies on Friday night when he loaded the bases with nobody out on a double and two walks.
But he was able to reset after a visit from pitching coach Mark Prior and gave up just one run in the inning that came home on a ground out.
On Sunday, he returned with a perfect inning.
Instead of getting excited for the return of Kelly’s old mechanics, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts just wants to see results. He has a playoff roster to put together, and while Kelly does have plenty of postseason experience, his spot is not necessarily guaranteed.
“With Joe, the focus is there and he understands what’s at stake for him and how important he can be for us,” Roberts said. “He needs to be dependable. I think there is a pitch selection thing with Joe that we all have to be on the same page with and then the results are the results.”
With the starting rotation in flux once again, as the postseason is set to arrive, the bullpen will play a major role in October. Kelly is up for the challenge and is confident the relievers are in a position to deliver, even as Daniel Hudson has struggled, Alex Vesia and Evan Phillips have been inconsistent and Brusdar Graterol has just six appearances.
“I feel like we’re there,” Kelly said. “You know, we’re all grinding to the end of this year, right? And then, you know, hopefully we get a top one or two seed, and we’ll have a little breather on the arms.”
Kelly certainly knows where he stands on the debate of whether or not a bye is actually a good thing as the wild card teams continue to slug it out.
“It’s a weird debate,” he said. “I would say, if I was a hitter, I would hate it, if I was a pitcher, I love it. And that’s shown, right? … It’s a good debate. It could be more of a timing thing, more mentally, you don’t know. Everyone’s different. So we’ll just have to play it out again this year too and see.”
UP NEXT
Padres (RHP Michael King, 12-9, 3.04 ERA) at Dodgers (RHP Landon Knack, 3-4, 3.39 ERA), Tuesday, 7:10 p.m., SportsNet LA, TBS, 570 AM