LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Dodgers’ latest brush with the unthinkable was grand enough to give them the early advantage in the World Series.
The Dodgers won Game 1 over the New York Yankees 6-3 on Friday when Freddie Freeman hit the first game-ending grand slam in World Series history. The titanic blast against Yankees left-hander Nestor Cortes came with the Dodgers one out away from defeat.
“I just felt good with Freddie at the plate,” Los Angeles manager Dave Roberts said. “And just that swing, you knew it was gone.”
The teams meet for Game 2 at Dodger Stadium on Saturday with Los Angeles looking to bring a 2-0 lead to New York next week.
Los Angeles continues to look like a team on a destiny march after Shohei Ohtani hit 54 home runs with 59 stolen bases in the regular season, and the team advanced through the National League Division Series and NL Championship Series with just three healthy starting pitchers.
Freeman earned his date with history after a rocky second half of the season. He missed eight games as his young son battled through a serious illness, and then had to play the past month on a badly sprained right ankle.
“I feel OK right now, so I should be in there (for Game 2),” said Freeman, who missed two of the last three games in the NLCS. “… We’ll see how I wake up, but I think we’re in a really good spot with my ankle. These last six days were huge for me.”
The Dodgers are set to send Yoshinobu Yamamoto to the mound on Saturday. The right-hander went 7-2 with a 3.00 ERA in the first year of a 12-year, $325 million contract, missing three months due to a shoulder injury. He is 1-0 with a 5.11 ERA through three postseason starts.
In a June 7 start against the Yankees in New York, Yamamoto went seven scoreless innings with seven strikeouts in an eventual Dodgers victory.
“I think the experience from June will benefit me a little bit, but this is the World Series, and the lineup might also probably be different from June,” Yamamoto said through an interpreter.
The Yankees received a go-ahead home run from Giancarlo Stanton in the sixth inning Friday before the Dodgers tied it 2-2 in the eighth on a sacrifice fly from Mookie Betts. New York took a 3-2 lead in the 10th on a Jazz Chisholm Jr. single, two stolen bases and a run-scoring grounder from Anthony Volpe.
“We had our chances,” New York slugger Aaron Judge said. “It was kind of back and forth the whole game. They went … ahead and then (Stanton) responded with a big two-run homer. We had our opportunities to put them away and just couldn’t do it, and they came up with a big clutch hit there in the end.”
The Yankees will counter with left-hander Carlos Rodon in Game 2 after he went 16-9 with a 3.96 ERA in 32 regular-season starts. In three postseason starts, Rodon is 1-1 with a 4.40 ERA, including a start in Game 5 of the ALCS when he gave up two runs in 4 2/3 innings against the Cleveland Guardians.
In five career starts against the Dodgers, Rodon is 1-2 with a 4.50 ERA.
“They can definitely swing it, and they have a good idea what the strike zone is,” Rodon said. “Just trying to stay focused on pitch by pitch. … Keep it under control and just going out there and competing.”
–Doug Padilla, Field Level Media
