By Matt Velez
The Los Angeles Dodgers won their eighth World Series title Oct. 30 with a Game 5 win against the New York Yankees, and what a Game 5 it was.
We saw a pitching rematch of Game 1: The Yankees’ Gerrit Cole and the Dodgers’ Jack Flaherty. Cole, who recorded a 2.17 ERA in the postseason, saw his infield absolutely collapse in a win-or-go-home game. Jack Flaherty on the other hand, collapsed on the mound, giving up 5 runs within just 1 1/3 innings. The Yankees were off to a phenomenal start.
In the first inning, Juan Soto was walked on five pitches with one out, then Aaron Judge came up to the plate. Judge had a historic regular season but a poor postseason, batting .140. But with one swing, he sent Flaherty’s pitch into deep right-center, and in the blink of an eye, it was 2-0 New York. Jazz Chisholm Jr. followed with another home run on a 2-1 pitch, making it 3-0 Yankees. Cole wasted no time retiring the first inning of offense for L.A.
In the second inning, the Yankees picked up right where they left off, with hometown hero Anthony Volpe hitting a double down the left-field line. After Flaherty got Austin Wells to ground out, Alex Verdugo sent a base hit into right-center to make it 4-0.
Anthony Banda replaced Flaherty but didn’t make things any easier for the Dodgers. He threw multiple wild pitches to load the bases with two outs. Fortunately for the Dodgers, Chisholm grounded out to the first-base side to end the inning.
Giancarlo Stanton slammed one into right to lead off the bottom of the third inning, and it was 5-0 New York.
Cole kept the Dodgers hitless through four innings with help from Judge, who banged off the 339 feet sign as he caught Freddie Freeman’s drive to left-center field.
Then everything turned around.
Kike Hernandez got the Dodgers’ first hit of the game to lead off the top of the fifth inning. Tommy Edman lined one into center but Aaron Judge dropped it, and the floodgates opened. Will Smith grounded a ball to Volpe, who made a bad throw to third base, and the Dodgers had quickly loaded the bases with no one out. Shortly after, Cole locked in and struck out both Gavin Lux and Shohei Ohtani. Only needing one more out, the errors continued. Mookie Betts grounded to first and Rizzo scooped it, but with no one covering the bag, a run scored and it remained bases loaded. Freeman, who has been on fire the entire postseason, sent a base hit into center to cut the lead to 5-3. To conclude a horrendous inning for the Yankees, Teoscar Hernandez doubled on a high fly ball into center and just like that, it was tied 5-5 in the fifth.
In the late stages of the game, the Yankees had an opportunity to save their season. In the bottom of the sixth inning, the Yankees quickly put runners on the corners, and with a sacrifice fly from Stanton, the Yankees retook the lead, 6-5.
In the eighth inning, the Dodgers solidified themselves and ran away with the game. From the Yankees bullpen, a walk, base hit, and catcher’s interference loaded the bases for Gavin Lux, who hit a sacrifice fly to center to drive in Kike Hernandez and tie the game. Mookie Betts gave the Dodgers a 7-6 lead with a sacrifice fly to score Tommy Edman.
With just six outs to cement themselves into baseball immortality, the Dodgers held strong. Blake Treinen, who had come in to close out the sixth inning with the Yankees up by 1, struck out Anthony Rizzo to end the eighth. Dodgers starter Walker Buehler earned the save, striking out Wells and Verdugo to end the game and clinch the World Series.
Buehler, who had pitched five scoreless innings in the Dodgers 4-2 win in Game 3 two days earlier, said after the game he had no signal or intent of playing.
Post-game, former Yankee Alex Rodriguez said it was “the greatest meltdown I’ve seen in 40 years. With that, an amazing 2024 season will forever live on in the history of the MLB as the Yankees and Dodgers played each other once again in the World Series, this time, in just a short series of 5. Inevitably it is going to be exciting to see how the Dodgers could potentially improve with Shoehi pitching soon, and for the Yankees, the question of Juan Soto being a free agent raises a lot of questions for many teams.”
