Dodgers beat Yankees to win another World Series, cement ‘golden era’ of franchise dominance

NEW YORK —  It had felt so close, yet remained so difficult to cement.

For more than a decade, the Dodgers had aimed for more than just regular-season success. More than just repeated trips to the postseason. More than just a lone, COVID-bubble championship in a pandemic-shortened 2020 season.

This, as president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman had declared time and again, was supposed to be a “golden era of Dodgers baseball,” a generation of organizational excellence unmatched in the storied, but often tortured, history of the century-old franchise.

The fact it hadn’t become that yet was a source of annual internal consternation. So much so, even Friedman’s deep-pocketed bosses became fed up.

As the Dodgers wooed then-free agent Shohei Ohtani this winter — pitching the two-way star and two-time MVP as the missing piece to the team’s still incomplete legacy — it was the club’s Mark Walter-led ownership group that delivered the most resounding message.

“They said when they look back at the last 10 years, even though they’ve made the playoffs every single year, and won a World Series ring, they consider that a failure,” Ohtani later recounted at his introductory Dodgers news conference. “When I heard that, I knew that they were all about winning.”

Indeed, from the fires of past October failures, the Dodgers forged a renewed resolve this year.

And in Game 5 of the World Series on Wednesday night, it led them to a championship in the most stunning of ways.

Despite falling behind the New York Yankees by five runs in the first three innings Wednesday night, the Dodgers mounted a title-winning rally. They scored five times in a fifth-inning rally fueled by shockingly poor Yankees defense, including a dropped line drive in center field from Aaron Judge and Gerrit Cole’s confounding decision to not cover first base.

After falling behind again in the sixth inning, the Dodgers found yet another answer. In the top of the eighth, they loaded the bases against Yankees reliever Tommy Kahnle, then hit two sacrifice flies off closer Luke Weaver to take the lead.

The final six outs were stressful, with Blake Treinen taking care of the eighth, and — in another unthinkable turn — starting pitcher Walker Buehler emerging for the save in the ninth.

When the last out was recorded, a club so hungry to add to its 2020 title came pouring out of the dugout, mobbing Buehler on the mound.

They’d finally crossed the threshold of baseball immortally. They validated the golden era they had so long been chasing.

With an 7-6 defeat of the Yankees, securing a four games to one series win, they were once again champions of baseball.

Fighting, scratching and clawing all the way to the end.

This Dodgers’ team always seemed destined to reach the mountaintop. They made sure of that in the winter, when a roster already headlined by former MVP winners Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman was bolstered by the additions of Ohtani, star Japanese pitcher Yoshnibu Yamamoto, expected ace Tyler Glasnow and veteran outfielder Teoscar Hernández; and the re-signing of the most central figure of the franchise’s recent past, future Hall of Fame pitcher Clayton Kershaw.

In the regular season, they led the majors with 98 wins, won the National League West for the 11th time in the last 12 years and watched Ohtani make history with an historic 54-homer, 59-steal campaign that will assuredly result in his third MVP award.

However, completing the franchise’s recent run of regular-season superiority with another World Series championship didn’t come easy.

There was scandal early in the season, when Ohtani’s former interpreter, Ippei Mizuhara, was fired by the team and later arrested for stealing nearly $17 million from the slugger to cover gambling losses.

There were injuries throughout the campaign, from Betts’ broken hand in June, to Freeman’s broken finger in August, to a litany of pitching losses that sidelined Glasnow, Kershaw and standout rookie Gavin Stone for the postseason.

There was October adversity, as well. Freeman was limited by a badly sprained right ankle. Betts and Ohtani both endured early playoff scuffles. And in the NL Division Series, the club faced elimination against the rival San Diego Padres after just three games.

“Having to go through the Padres in that DS,” Roberts said, “was just kind of a grind.”

Nothing, however, felt as difficult as Wednesday’s title-clinching win.

After rallying against the Padres, then dispatching the New York Mets in six games to win the pennant, the Dodgers rode the momentum of Freeman’s walk-off grand slam in Game 1 of the World Series to a three-games-to-lead entering Wednesday night.

And having already squandered one close-out opportunity in Game 4, they seemed headed toward another missed chance early on.

Four batters into the game, the Yankees had a 3-0 lead on home runs from Judge and Jazz Chisholm off Flaherty. By the end of the third, it was 5-0, with the Dodgers still searching for a hit off Cole, the Yankees’ ace.

But in the top of the fifth inning, everything changed.

After a leadoff single from Kiké Hernández, the Yankees’ defense suffered a total capitulation.

Judge flat-out dropped a line drive off the bat of Tommy Edman, then couldn’t throw in time to second to get Hernández, who made a heads-up turn to slide in safely.

Shortstop Anthony Volpe then erred next, spiking a throw to third on a ground ball from Will Smith to load the bases with no outs.

Cole was on the verge of escaping the inning, after striking out Gavin Lux and Ohtani in consecutive at-bats. But when Betts hit a slow grounder to Anthony Rizzo at first, Cole didn’t run over to cover the base. Hernández scored. Everyone else was safe.

With the comeback window suddenly cracked open, the Dodgers made sure to take immediate advantage.

Freeman knuckled a two-run single to center, tying a World Series record with his 11th and 12th RBIs of the week. Teoscar Hernández tied the score in the next at-bat, blasting a two-run double over Judge’s head in left center.

The Yankees would lead again, after Giancarlo Stanton hit a sacrifice fly in the sixth.

But in front of a stunned 49,263 crowd, they never fully recovered.

Kahnle created the Series-deciding jam in the top of the eighth, giving up singles to Kiké Hernández and Edman before walking Smith to load the bases. The Yankees turned to Weaver, their closer, to try and escape the jam. But he yielded sacrifice flies to Lux and Betts, putting the Dodgers ahead 7-6.

Despite being almost completely out of relievers, the Dodgers wouldn’t relinquish the lead again.

In what was his third inning of work, Treinen faced trouble in the eighth, as two Yankees reached base with only one out. Buehler was warming at that point. So too was veteran right-hander Daniel Hudson.

But when Roberts walked out to the mound, he decided to leave Treinen out there. The decision was rewarded. Treinen got a fly ball from Stanton and a sweeping, swinging strikeout of Rizzo to end the inning.

That left the ninth for Buehler, who was only two days removed from a winning five-inning start in Game 3.

It was his first career postseason relief appearance. And, as an impending free agent, potentially his final outing with the team.

Sixteen pitches and two outs later, he flung his arms in the air as Alex Verdugo whiffed at a curveball for a championship-clinching — and golden era cementing — strike three.