Freddie Freeman contemplated the query, stared quietly into the space, then struggled to articulate a solution.
5 months after the very fact, his swing for the ages was nonetheless sinking in.
On Oct. 25, in an evening endlessly etched into Dodgers and Main League Baseball lore, Freeman delivered his walk-off grand slam in Sport 1 of the World Sequence. With only one swing, he’d altered the result of a season, the fortunes of a franchise and the feelings of a fan base starved for greater than three a long time for a full-season championship.
However on today, throughout the ultimate week of Dodgers spring coaching earlier this month, Freeman mentioned he was “still trying to process” his private perspective on his second of historical past.
The totality of that one swing — out of the numerous 1000’s he has taken throughout a 15-year profession within the majors that, along with his eight All-Star picks, 2020 MVP award and almost 2,300 complete hits, was already on a possible Corridor of Fame observe — had but to completely resonate inside him.
“It’s hard to wrap [your mind] around, when you’re so fresh out of it,” Freeman mentioned whereas standing outdoors the Dodgers’ Camelback Ranch facility, the place close by followers started chanting his identify within the background. “But yeah, I can’t go anywhere anymore without someone coming up. Everyone knows who I am.”
For Freeman, moments like these have offered essentially the most significant readability, finest illustrating to him the importance of the walk-off slam.
The 35-year-old slugger, after all, has lengthy operated beneath the highlight of superstar. He was the face of a franchise for one World Sequence winner earlier than, main the Atlanta Braves to the title in 2021. He grew to become a beloved determine within the Southland the next spring, when the Orange County native returned dwelling to signal with the Dodgers in one of many many blockbuster acquisitions that preceded final yr’s championship.
This offseason, nevertheless, was completely different. Not solely due to the “10-fold, maybe even 20-, 30-, 40-, 50-fold” enhance in consideration he mentioned he garnered in public, from grocery shops and charity appearances, to well-attended fan occasions or just quiet days out of the home. However extra so, he famous, due to what the individuals who stopped him repeatedly mentioned.
Freddie Freeman holds his bat within the air as he watches his walk-off grand slam in Sport 1 of the World Sequence towards the Yankees at Dodger Stadium.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Instances)
“There’s not a day that goes by where someone doesn’t say, ‘Thank you,’” Freeman relayed. “And I’m appreciative of it. Because obviously, it means something really good happened.”
With fun, Freeman joked that “I’m still not Shohei,” his fame remaining dwarfed by that of his internationally recognizable Japanese teammate.
However as Freeman has internalized the impression of his World Sequence second this offseason, it’s been via these ceaseless interactions with followers that he realized the impression the second made on him.
“I like to just kinda do my job and go home,” he mentioned earlier this spring, when he solely half-jokingly acknowledged being “very uncomfortable” with all of his newfound consideration. “But that’s OK. I appreciate it. I really do … You appreciate what you were able to create for people. I don’t take that for granted.”
There is likely to be just one particular person on the planet who can relate to what Freeman has, and can, expertise within the wake of his World Sequence heroics.
And within the second, he may really feel Freeman’s grand slam was about to occur.
Again in 1988, Kirk Gibson hit essentially the most well-known dwelling run in Dodgers historical past. Whereas enjoying via a muscle tear in his left hamstring and ligament tear in his proper knee, he hit a walk-off dwelling run in Sport 1 of that yr’s World Sequence, fist-pumping his means across the bases whereas catapulting the Dodgers to an eventual championship.
So, when Freeman — who was enjoying via his personal accidents final October, together with a badly sprained proper ankle and torn left rib cartilage — got here to the plate within the backside of the tenth inning in Sport 1 of final yr’s Fall Basic, Gibson couldn’t assist however have a flashback.
He had a premonition that historical past would repeat itself.
Kirk Gibson raises his arms as he rounds the bases after hitting a recreation–successful two-run homer in Sport 1 of the 1988 World Sequence.
(Los Angeles Instances)
“I just felt it happening before it happened,” mentioned Gibson, who was listening to a radio broadcast of the sport on his telephone whereas huddled with some mates at a cabin in Michigan. “The thought entered my mind — much the same way it entered my mind when I was gonna have the opportunity. It’s just like, the perfect storm just keeps developing.”
Certainly, Freeman delivered in nearly precisely the identical means Gibson did. He launched his dwelling run to the proper area pavilion, not removed from the place Gibson’s ball landed 36 years earlier. He celebrated along with his personal iconic response, holding his bat within the air Statue of Liberty-style. Even the timing was eerily related — each dwelling runs have been hit at 8:37 p.m.
“When you hit a ball that square, that solid, you don’t even really feel it,” Gibson mentioned, remarking on yet one more parallel of the 2 blasts in a latest telephone interview. “You know from experience it’s going to go a long way. So then you get your bat on the ground, and your hand in the air.”
“Or fist in the air, in my case,” Gibson added with fun.
Kirk Gibson’s game-winning dwelling run from Sport 1 of the 1988 World Sequence.
“To get the opportunity, and follow through on the opportunity, it’s ecstatic. It’s very decadent. Feels real good. Tastes real good.”
Nonetheless, like Freeman, Gibson additionally struggled to initially admire the magnitude of his second.
Like Freeman, it was interactions in public with followers that opened his eyes to its long-lasting resonance.
“It’s very humbling to this day for people to say, ‘Oh, he’s the guy who hit the home run,’” Gibson mentioned. “They start pumping their arm. It’s a little bit embarrassing; and that’s probably not a good word … But when they do that, they mean well.”
For Freeman, some interactions stood out greater than most this winter. Like the 2 separate situations followers confirmed him tattoos they bought to commemorate his World Sequence walk-off. Or the person he met at a preseason luncheon who advised him the house run had prompted him to surrender consuming.
“He wanted to be with his kids, present, [because] they were in the right field stands,” Freeman recalled on the Dodgers’ fan fest occasion earlier than the beginning of spring. “He didn’t drink that whole game, and he hasn’t drank since, because of how present he was with his kids.”
“Those are the stories,” Freeman added, “that give me chills.”
Nonetheless, nothing compares to the straightforward “thank you” many who’ve approached him have felt obliged to supply. And the extra it began occurring, the extra Freeman understood what the second meant to him.
When Freeman first arrived in Los Angeles in 2022, he was nonetheless grappling with the feelings of his surprising departure from Atlanta that offseason (yet one more similarity with Gibson, a longtime Detroit Tiger who described feeling “melancholy” when he first arrived in Los Angeles in 1988). As Freeman struggled along with his transition, it was Dodger Stadium chants of “Fred-die! Fred-die!” that helped him really feel welcome in his new dwelling.
Final August, when Freeman returned from a weeklong absence whereas his 3-year-old son, Max, battled a daunting neurological dysfunction that left the toddler briefly paralyzed, a rousing ovation at Dodger Stadium accompanied his first at-bat again.
“These three years I’ve been here, it’s hard to put into words what the Dodgers fans have meant to us and our family,” Freeman mentioned that night time. “In the toughest times, it shows the true character of this organization’s fans, and it’s absolutely incredible.”
It’s why he believes, when he rounded the bases in Sport 1 of the World Sequence a pair months later, he was so animated amid the walk-off Chavez Ravine scene.
Freddie Freeman was very animated as he rounded the bases after his walk-off grand slam to win Sport 1 of the World Sequence final fall.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Instances)
There was his iconic bat increase, after all, which marked a stark break from character for somebody who proudly claims to have “never pimped a home run.” (Freeman mentioned it wasn’t a premeditated celebration, however famous with fun that “my dad said I used to do that on my brothers in the backyard.”) His arm-flexing scream between second and third base was additionally a spur-of-the-moment response, with Freeman solely remembering that he wished to eschew the group’s regular two-handed-wave dwelling run celebration.
“It just wasn’t a waving moment,” he mentioned. “So that’s what came out.”
When Freeman rewatched movies of the sequence along with his oldest son, Charlie, this offseason, he mentioned the clips of his response have been what struck him essentially the most. Wanting again, he knew it was a launch of feelings after the difficulties of his season. Greater than that, although, it was his means, he defined, of attempting to say thanks to the followers.
“You can never repay that, how people make you feel,” he mentioned. “But it was like a ‘thank you’ for how they’ve treated the Freemans and me. That’s how I’ve actually gone and looked at it the last couple months, as my ‘thank you’ to Los Angeles for how they’ve treated my family.
“It was so hard for me to come to the field after Max got sick. And every time I came, they lifted me up. They lifted my family up. So that’s what I’ve been thinking about the most … They helped me get through that. And I was able to help them have a championship.”
Dodgers supervisor Dave Roberts was as soon as the writer of his personal legendary October second, when his stolen base in Sport 4 of the 2004 American League Championship Sequence helped lead the Boston Pink Sox to a historic comeback from a three-games-to-none deficit.
The lesson he discovered then?
“In sports, people really look towards moments in time,” he mentioned.
And as soon as they occur, he famous, individuals additionally by no means appear to overlook.
“In sports, people really look towards moments in time,” mentioned Dodgers supervisor Dave Roberts, above hugging Freddie Freeman after L.A. had gained the World Sequence.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Instances)
“A lot of it depends on how everybody treats it afterward,” echoed Gibson, who mentioned he can generally nonetheless really feel awkward about how his 1988 dwelling run overshadowed contributions from others on that yr’s Dodger group, in addition to different highlights in his 17-year profession. “You have really no way, in my case, of preparing for ultimately how it plays out.”
Freeman may discover himself in an identical place. The eye he’s acquired gained’t quickly dissipate. If something, nearly no matter his future contributions, a central piece of his Dodger legacy has already been solidified.
“He’s going to hear it every day, certainly during the baseball season,” Roberts mentioned, “about how someone was grateful or thankful for that moment.”
On the similar time, Freeman is attempting to reset for the 2025 season, get again to full well being whereas persevering with to battle the lingering results of his October accidents, and assist put the Dodgers in place once more to create extra legendary World Sequence reminiscences.
“That’s all we’re trying to do, is put ourselves in the best spot to succeed,” Freeman mentioned. “It’s hard for me to think about the bigger picture of a home run when, like now, I’m getting for the next season. So that’s the hard thing. I haven’t really been able to let it sink in.”
Roberts, nevertheless, has no issues about how his veteran first baseman will deal with such a dynamic coming into the 2025 season.
“He just does a great job of focusing on the job at hand,” Roberts mentioned, “and certainly having the gratitude — that appreciation — for what that moment did for many, many Dodger fans across the world.”
That’s why, whereas Freeman stays considerably cautious of the general public highlight, he has fortunately embraced all of his private interactions with followers. Via them, he has felt the tangible impacts his grand slam created. Via them, he has began to comprehend his personal emotional response to it as effectively.
“Obviously, the rings and the championships, that’s what we’re going for,” Freeman mentioned. “But to be able to impact the lives that we’ve been able to do in 2024, that’s why you play sports. To be able to give someone that was special.”
