They were going to win. They were going to lose. All in one breath, all in one month.
Win. Lose. Win. Lose. Win. Lose.
Win!!!
Weeks later the chest still pounds, the throat still thickens, the mind still has not completely grasped.
The Dodgers won their second consecutive World Series championship this fall in pure dramatic art.
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A catch worthy of a statue. An out at home plate by history-making inches. A cheating outfielder steals a victory. A struggling first baseman steals a marathon. A sore-handed catcher steals a title.
The greatest postseason game by one player in baseball history. The greatest World Series by one pitcher in baseball history. The greatest moment by a Dodgers benchwarmer in baseball history, a guy so embedded in the landscape of Los Angeles sports that he forever will be known simply by two abbreviated versions of his name…
Enough said.
It’s perhaps appropriate today to give thanks for the drama, thanks for the art, thanks for the breathtaking uncertainty of the diamonds of October.
Thanks, baseball, for creating the tableau for the Dodgers’ 13 most memorable playoff moments, one for every win, one for every scream, one for every occasion when you thought it couldn’t get any crazier.
Then it did.
The Wheel
Who knew the Dodgers could so deftly field a bunt play? And who knew that this teamwork would strike the first big postseason blow against their most talented postseason opponent?
Division Series, Philadelphia Phillies, Game 2, ninth inning, the Dodgers lead 4-3 but there is a runner on second with none out.
A normally fielded bunt by Bryson Stott would have moved Nick Castellanos to third and put him in perfect position to tie the game. But the Dodgers ran the little-used “Wheel Play” in which third baseman Max Muncy fielded the bunt and spun and threw to Mookie Betts to tag Castellanos and save the game.
Betts suggested the play. Manager Dave Roberts signed off on the play. The Dodgers' teamwork made the play work.
“We do a pretty good job of putting each other in good spots to be successful,” Betts said afterward.
The rest of the baseball world soon would learn just how successful.
Orion’s Fallen Star
A year earlier, the Dodgers clinched the World Series on a night of New York Yankees meltdowns.
This autumn, the Dodgers clinched the division series on a night of a singular, stunning meltdown.
Dodgers fans forever will see Phillies reliever Orion Kerkering botching Andy Pages’ grounder, panicking, then throwing wildly home to enable Hyeseong Kim to score the winning run in the 11th inning of Game 4, sending the Dodgers to the championship series.
It was the play that launched the three-sentence scream heard around town at various times for the rest of the nutty postseason…
“That’s it? We won? We won!”
'Feeling Good'
The Dodgers cued up Shohei Ohtani’s walk-up song by Michael Bublé one afternoon in honor of his rarest of performances.
During the day off in the NLCS against the Milwaukee Brewers, Ohtani stunningly left the indoor cage and took on-field batting practice, a rare occurrence.
He was, at the time, two for his last 25 with a dozen strikeouts. He was facing criticism that his pitching was affecting his hitting. The weight of the series was resting his giant shoulders.
He promptly put on a show, 14 of his 32 batting-practice swings resulting in home runs, including one that bounced off the right-field roof, a massive light show that contained a singular message.
“I got this.”
He’s Got This
Two days after the momentous batting practice show, Ohtani did it for real, putting on a postseason pitching and hitting display for the ages, starting a wondrous debate that continues to this day.
What was more impressive?
His first-inning leadoff home run that followed his three first-inning strikeouts of the Brewers?
His fourth-inning homer after striking out the last two batters in the top of the inning?
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His seventh-inning home run that came almost immediately after he was pulled from the game as a pitcher and should have been resting?
Since the fourth-inning blast soared over the right-field roof, um, er, I’ll go with that one.
And oh, his three-homer, 10-strikeout, six-plus-innings performance sent the Dodgers to the World Series.
Where things really got interesting.
The Farewell
It was eight pitches. It resulted in one out. It made barely a sound amid the fireworks that surrounded it.
But perhaps no moment of the postseason was more enduring than Clayton Kershaw coming into World Series Game 3 against the Toronto Blue Jays with two out in the 12th inning and escaping a bases-loaded jam by inducing a ground ball by Nathan Lukes.
Because, it turns out, after 18 years, it was Kershaw’s last out as a Dodger.
And what if he had blown it? What if his legendary October demons engulfed him one last time?
The way the crowd was so tensely silent during the Lukes at-bat, one got the feeling that everyone was thinking the same thing.
The collective sigh of relief was overshadowed only by the roar.
The Dance
It’s not fair that Freddie Freeman’s 18th-inning home run to end what equaled the longest World Series game will be somewhat forgotten in the wake of last year’s game-winning World Series grand slam.
But what I’ll remember most from this year’s heroics was the iconic celebration afterward, a dancing Ohtani skipping down to the bullpen with a dancing Roki Sasaki to engage in a group hug with a dancing Yoshinobu Yamamoto.
The three Japanese stars truly had found a home in Chavez Ravine, in each other, and in October.
The Dodgers had only a two-games-to-one lead in the World Series at the time, but was there any doubt their three Japanese stars wouldn't let them lose?
The Belly Flop
During the day-off workout before the Dodgers faced overcoming a three-games-to-two deficit in Toronto, Roberts issued the strangest challenge.
He claimed he could beat speedster Kim in a race around the bases.
The bet lasted barely 90 feet, as Roberts stumbled and face-planted just past second base, a pratfall captured on social media and celebrated by his laughing players.
His team loved the hell out of Roberts for doing it, and used the relaxed atmosphere to spark themselves to consecutive backs-to-the-wall victories.
“Of course it makes you smile and it makes you have a good time,” Rojas said.
Those good times were just beginning.
Señor October
Whether it’s hitting three home runs in an NLCS clinching game against the Chicago Cubs in 2017 or hitting a homer in the NLDS clinching game against the San Diego Padres seven years later, Kiké Hernández seemingly always has been in the middle of the dynasty Dodgers' success.
But never before had he stolen a game without his bat.
That’s what happened in the final breaths of Game 6 of the World Series when Hernández played against-all-orders shallow and picked off an Andrés Giménez line drive and threw to second to double off a straying Addison Barger and end the game with an intact 3-1 edge.
A role player during the regular season, Hernández once again saved them when it mattered most.
Remember that catch and throw when you don’t see him again until next October.
Miggy Ro
This requires only one sentence, because it’s already been ingrained deep in your soul.
Two outs from elimination in Game 7, on a full-count pitch from Toronto closer Jeff Hoffman in the ninth inning, Miguel Rojas tied the score by hitting only his second home run since the All-Star break.
Miggy Ro forever.
Oh, Yeah, Wait, One More
In the bottom of the ninth in Game 7, playing second base with the infield in, Rojas cleanly fielded a grounder and threw out Isiah Kiner-Falefa by inches at home plate to save the game.
Kiner-Falefa has since taken plenty of grief for not taking a bigger lead from third that would have allowed him to beat the throw, but the bottom line is, Rojas made the great catch and throw and Will Smith made the great play and the Blue Jays simply were doomed.
Miggy Ro forever… again.
The Statue
If the Dodgers were to hire a sculptor to encapsulate their 2025 playoff run, the artist undoubtedly would bronze a replica of Pages leaping over Hernández in left field to snare an Ernie Clement fly ball with two out and bases loaded in the ninth to send Game 7 to extra innings.
It was then that you just knew the Dodgers were going to win this. Somehow, the Dodgers were going to win this.
The Home Run
The most understated Dodgers hit, possibly the most understated World Series Game 7 game-winning home run ever, an 11th-inning drive that cannot be overstated for one reason.
Two months earlier, Smith had broken his throwing hand. Two months earlier. A broken throwing hand. For a catcher. Think about that.
From Bulldog to….
Orel Hershiser made Dodgers history in 1988 with postseason pitching resilience that cemented his famous nickname.
So with “Bulldog” taken, what should everyone call Yamamoto?
Three World Series wins in a span of eight days? Nearly three innings to close out Game 7 after throwing 96 pitches the night before?
The locals will have a joyous holiday season to figure it out.
Happy Dodgers. Happy history. Happy Thanksgiving.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
