You have to give credit to Freddie Freeman, Shohei Ohtani, and the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Yankees certainly did.
When New York allowed LA back into World Series Game 5, the talented Dodgers did what they’ve done all season — they kept pushing forward and finished strong.
After capitalizing on three mistakes to erase a five-run deficit in the fifth inning during one of the most unforgettable midgame collapses in baseball history, the Dodgers scored again with sacrifice flies from Gavin Lux and Mookie Betts in the eighth to win 7-6 on Wednesday night.
“We’re obviously resilient, but there’s so much love in the clubhouse that won this game today,” Betts said. “That’s what it was. It was love, it was grit. I mean, it was just a beautiful thing. I’m just proud of us and I’m happy for us.”
Aaron Judge and Jazz Chisholm Jr. hit back-to-back home runs in the first inning for New York. Alex Verdugo’s RBI single knocked Jack Flaherty out in the second, and Giancarlo Stanton’s homer in the third off Ryan Brasier gave the Yankees a 5-0 lead.
But errors by Judge in center field and Anthony Volpe at shortstop, along with pitcher Gerrit Cole not covering first base on Betts’ grounder, allowed Los Angeles to score five unearned runs in the fifth.
“This is going to sting forever,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “I’m heartbroken.”
After Stanton’s sacrifice fly in the sixth put the Yankees back in front 6-5, the Dodgers loaded the bases against losing pitcher Tommy Kahnle in the eighth, leading to the sacrifice flies off Luke Weaver.
Judge doubled off winning pitcher Blake Treinen with one out in the bottom half, and Chisholm walked. Manager Dave Roberts went to the mound with Treinen at 37 pitches.
“I looked in his eyes. I said how you feeling? How much more you got?” Roberts recalled. “He said: `I want it.’ I trust him.” Treinen got Stanton out with a fly ball and struck out Anthony Rizzo.
Walker Buehler, making his first relief appearance since his rookie year in 2018, pitched a perfect ninth inning for his first major league save.
When Buehler struck out Verdugo to finish the game, the Dodgers ran onto the field to celebrate between the mound and first base, ending a season where they won 98 games and had the best regular-season record.
With several thousand Dodgers fans still in a mostly empty stadium, baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred presented the trophy on a platform quickly set up over second base.
“There’s just a lot of ways we can win baseball games,” Buehler said. “Obviously the superstars we have on our team and the discipline, it just kind of all adds up.”
Shohei Ohtani, the Dodgers’ record-setting $700 million signing and the first player in baseball history to hit 50 home runs and steal 50 bases in a season, went 2 for 19 with no RBIs and only one single after injuring his left shoulder during a stolen base attempt in Game 2.
Freddie Freeman hit a two-run single that tied the Series record of 12 RBIs, set by Bobby Richardson in 1960 over seven games, and was named Series MVP.
With the Dodgers just one out away from losing Friday’s opening game, Freeman hit a game-ending grand slam, similar to Kirk Gibson’s famous homer against Oakland’s Dennis Eckersley in 1988, which helped Los Angeles win the title.
The Dodgers secured their eighth championship and seventh since moving from Brooklyn to Los Angeles — their first in a full season since 1988.
They won a neutral-site World Series against Tampa Bay in 2020 after a 60-game regular season and couldn’t hold a parade due to the coronavirus pandemic.
These Dodgers, featuring Ohtani, Freeman, and Betts, join the ranks of great teams like the 1955 Boys of Summer with Duke Snider and Roy Campanella, the Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale teams that won three titles from 1959-65, the Tommy Lasorda-led squads in 1981 and ’88, and the champions of 2020 with Betts and Clayton Kershaw.
Ending a season that began with a gambling scandal involving Ohtani’s interpreter, Roberts won his second championship in nine years as the Dodgers’ manager, matching Tommy Lasorda and trailing only Walter Alston, who has four. The Dodgers won for the fourth time in 12 World Series matchups against the Yankees.
New York has not won a title since their record 27th in 2009. The Yankees acquired Juan Soto from San Diego in December, knowing he would be a free agent after the 2024 World Series.
The 26-year-old star went 5 for 16 with one RBI in the Series, leading up to a highly anticipated bidding war on the open market. Judge finished the Series with 4 for 18 and three RBIs.
Cole didn’t give up a hit until Kiké Hernández singled to start the fifth inning. Judge, who had made a great catch at the left-center wall to deny Freeman a hit just an inning earlier, dropped a fly ball from Tommy Edman in center.
Volpe then made an errant throw to third on Will Smith’s grounder, which allowed the Dodgers to load the bases with no outs.
Cole struck out Lux and Ohtani, and then Betts hit a grounder to Rizzo. Cole didn’t cover first base, pointing to Rizzo to run to the bag, but Betts was too quick for him.
Freeman then hit a two-run single, and Teoscar Hernández followed with a two-run double to tie the game. Max Muncy walked, and Kiké Hernández grounded into a forceout on Cole’s 48th pitch of the inning.
“We just take advantage of every mistake they made in that inning,” Teoscar Hernández said. “We put some good at-bats together. We put the ball in play.”
Stanton’s sacrifice fly in the sixth inning off Brusdar Graterol put the Yankees ahead 6-5, but the Dodgers made one last comeback in the eighth.
Kiké Hernández started with a single off Tommy Kahnle. Edman then hit an infield single, and Smith walked on four pitches. Lux’s sacrifice fly off Luke Weaver tied the game. Ohtani reached base on catcher’s interference, and Betts followed with another sacrifice fly to give the Dodgers their first lead.
Purchased by Guggenheim Baseball Management in 2012, the Dodgers hired Andrew Friedman from Tampa Bay to lead their baseball operations two years later. He improved the front office by adding many analytics and performance science staff, and ownership provided the necessary funds.
Los Angeles went on an extraordinary $1.25 billion spending spree last offseason, signing Ohtani, pitchers Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow, and James Paxton, as well as outfielder Teoscar Hernández.
A lot of this money was for future commitments, increasing the Dodgers’ deferred compensation to $915.5 million owed from 2028 to 2044.
Dealing with injuries, the Dodgers acquired Flaherty, Edman, and reliever Michael Kopech before the trade deadline, and all of them became key players in the championship run. These new additions raised the payroll to $266 million, which is third behind the Mets and the Yankees, along with a projected $43 million luxury tax.
