NEW YORK — The silent, somber Bronx all of the sudden was bathed in joyous dancing blue, a screaming scrum leaping and bouncing and hugging into historical past.
The Dodgers did it. They actually did it.
The hallowed New York Yankees stood frozen of their dugout, stripped of their aura and bludgeoned at their essence, painfully demolished pinstripe by pinstripe.
The Dodgers did it. They actually did it.
The workforce that chokes swallowed swords. The workforce that crumbles spit hearth. Essentially the most teeth-grinding nice workforce in baseball chomped by means of a legacy of frustration on the kind of October night time that, whereas as soon as forgettable, now will stay eternally.
The Dodgers received the World Sequence. They actually received the World Sequence.
They didn’t simply win it, they dominated it, they debilitated it, they freaking owned it, ending a five-game beating of the disintegrating Yankees on Wednesday at Yankee Stadium with a five-run comeback and a 7-6 victory to clinch the title 4 video games to 1.
Dodgers gamers have a good time with the World Sequence trophy after their Recreation 5 victory at Yankee Stadium
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Instances)
“It really doesn’t make sense to me right now,” reliever Blake Treinen stated, trying dazed whereas standing on a area stuffed with gold streamers and thick-throated teammates. “What a cool moment. This is amazing.”
Whereas it ended right here with the Dodgers joyfully participating in a gaggle hug that reworked this weathered city area into blue heaven on Earth, all hell was breaking unfastened on the opposite facet of the nation, the celebration of a connection that 2,792 miles couldn’t fray.
Go forward, Los Angeles, dance along with your Dodgers. Hug your Koufax-jerseyed neighbor, scream as much as Fernando and Scully and Lasorda, perhaps even cry somewhat. It’s OK, you deserve it, you earned it. You weren’t right here for the end, however you have been right here for the journey, greatest followers in baseball, filling Chavez Ravine all summer season, shaking the traditional stadium along with your unconditional assist, your lingering roars, your love.
“The Dodgers are the most important franchise in town right now,” stated Magic Johnson, half proprietor. “We needed a championship. The Dodgers needed to make this happen for the city of Los Angeles, bring back that championship feeling, show our fan base that we’ll do what it takes to win.”
And now? Johnson smiled as solely he can smile.
“Now we get a parade,” he stated. “The city deserves it; the last time [2020] we didn’t get one. Now they get one.”
The Dodgers have waited so lengthy for that parade, they’re speeding it into actuality Friday in downtown Los Angeles, completely timed with what would have been Fernando Valenzuela’s sixty fourth birthday. The legendary pitcher died three days earlier than the Sequence, but his inspiration lived on, on the workforce’s uniform patch and in its struggle.
“This is the toughest team I’ve ever seen,” Treinen stated. “You can’t measure the heart on this team.”
Yeah, the Dodgers actually did it, and in a way wherein no Dodgers workforce from Jackie to Bulldog to Kershaw had completed earlier than.
This was the best workforce in Los Angeles Dodgers historical past, hovering by means of the best postseason in Dodgers historical past, cementing the best Dodgers dynasty ever.
This was World Sequence Most worthy participant Freddie Freeman slugging, and Mookie Betts scampering, and Teoscar Hernández spraying, and Tommy Edman scooting, and sore-shouldered Shohei Ohtani making a distinction simply by standing.
This was a shaky rotation that turned to gold and a bullpen that turned to metal, with Yoshinobu Yamamoto robust early within the Sequence, Treinen dealing late, and Walker Buehler offering the completion Wednesday with a strikeout of Alex Verdugo on in the future’s relaxation.
The 1988 champions had Bulldog; the 2024 champions had Buehler.
“It was all adrenaline,” stated Buehler, who epitomized this workforce’s grit together with his first reduction look in six years. “I was getting worked on so I could play catch tomorrow, then I’m coming into the game.”
This was conventional Dodgers expertise combined with newfound Dodgers powerful, the flamable mixture exploding throughout the baseball world, leaving groups in tatters from the Pacific Ocean to the Hudson River.
This was the seventh championship in Los Angeles and eighth in franchise historical past, the primary for the reason that abbreviated season in 2020 and first full-season title since 1988.
“I’m sure there’s no asterisk on this one,” supervisor Dave Roberts stated.
Most gratifying, as a result of COVID-19 emptied the stadiums in 2020, so that is the Dodgers’ first title with house followers since that Orel Hershiser-led group of 36 years in the past.
Dodgers gamers cheer as Teoscar Hernández singles within the ninth inning. Hernández struck an enormous blow in a fifth-inning rally with a two-run double to tie the sport.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Instances)
In all, the 2024 Dodgers season was a imaginative and prescient met and a promise saved, lastly totally fulfilling the expectation inherent in 12 consecutive playoff berths that included 11 Nationwide League West titles.
All that {hardware} and just one freaking crown till now, when Wednesday’s emotional ending accomplished a loopy, compelling journey by means of their greatest autumn ever.
They have been right down to their final outs in opposition to the San Diego Padres, then received two straight video games to seize the Nationwide League Division Sequence.
They outscored the New York Mets 46-22 to win the Nationwide League Championship Sequence in six video games, which included the Dodgers pitching workers finishing a 33-inning scoreless streak.
They defeated the Yankees in Recreation 1 of the World Sequence with a walkoff grand slam by Freeman and by no means appeared again, gave away Recreation 4 to smash a sweep, however rebounded to drag off the best clinching-game comeback in World Sequence historical past.
They trailed 5-0 after three innings with house runs by Aaron Decide, Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Giancarlo Stanton. However the Yankees imploded with three terrible fielding performs within the fifth that allowed the Dodgers to tie the sport.
The Yankees took the lead once more within the sixth, however the Dodgers scored twice within the eighth on a few sacrifice flies — typical of a workforce that may unselfishly do something to win — and Treinen and Buehler shut down the Yankees to complete it.
“Tonight was basically the epitome of our season,” Max Muncy stated. “We got dealt a couple blows, came back, got dealt another blow, came back. It’s just guy after guy coming out, doing the job, grinding away, Walker coming in in the ninth. … It’s just, literally, the epitome of our season.”
Whew. Gasp. Screams. Tears. The Dodgers by no means have had 4 weeks like this.
“It seems like we hit every speed bump possible over the course of this year,” Freeman stated. “And to overcome what we did as a group of guys, it’s special.”
The title of biggest Los Angeles Dodgers workforce and biggest Dodgers postseason thus cemented, their two championships and 4 pennants within the final eight years additionally set up them as the best of Dodgers dynasties.
“My ultimate, kind of big-picture goal is that, when we are done, that we’re able to look back and say that was the golden era of Dodger baseball,” baseball president Andrew Friedman stated.
No must look again. It’s true now. That is the golden period of Dodgers baseball.
It reached that peak this fall appropriately with main contributions from the three leaders who’ve spent the final decade making an attempt to win this factor.
It begins with Mark Walter, the understated chairman and controlling proprietor of the Dodgers because the chief govt of Guggenheim Companions.
Walter isn’t round a lot — he didn’t attend Wednesday’s sport — however the pockets he controls by no means leaves, and together with his approval the Dodgers yearly have one among baseball’s highest payrolls. Over the winter he signed off on greater than $1 billion in contracts for the likes of Ohtani and Yamamoto, and you recognize what occurred subsequent.
Ohtani was the Nationwide League’s greatest participant and the largest distinction between this profitable playoff workforce and failures of the previous; witness his NLDS Recreation 1 house run that bought this occasion began. Yamamoto was injured for a lot of the summer season, however he beat the Padres within the NLDS elimination sport and was an October revelation.
“We came here understanding what this organization was about,” stated president and co-owner Stan Kasten, who was a part of the Guggenheim group that purchased the bankrupt workforce in 2012. “We knew about the legacy we were privileged enough to continue. It’s Jackie and Sandy and Fernando and on and on. We took that responsibility seriously.”
Compounding Guggenheim’s funding has been the famend acumen of Friedman, baseball’s greatest govt who had a stellar season that far exceeded even the signings of Ohtani and Yamamoto.
Don’t overlook, final winter Friedman additionally signed Teoscar Hernández, the workforce’s second MVP. Then, on the summer season buying and selling deadline, he hit the trifecta by dealing for Edman, Michael Kopech and Jack Flaherty, all three big October contributors.
The ultimate out of the Dodgers’ Recreation 5 win over the New York Yankees to clinch the 2024 World Sequence title.
Lastly, bringing the items of Walter and Friedman collectively was Roberts, who went from the new seat to a doable spot within the Baseball Corridor of Fame by deftly managing this numerous group to his second title in 9 seasons.
All through a summer season stuffed with pitching accidents and Betts place intrigue, Roberts was a gentle drive, persistently constructive, unflinchingly regular, in the end steering the workforce by means of waters that sometimes have troubled him.
Translated, he did a terrific job managing his October bullpen, pushing all the fitting buttons and neatly main them by means of 4 bullpen-only video games necessitated by beginning pitching accidents.
“This is something I really wanted, I wanted this one,” stated Roberts, who by no means has acquired the credit score from the followers that he deserves.
He needed it, and his gamers needed it, and their connection mixed to get the very best out everyone in blue. After a month that was once hell and all of the sudden turned heaven, their greatest was greater than sufficient to lastly give them the title of baseball’s greatest.
The Dodgers received the World Sequence. They actually received the World Sequence.
