Yankees cant hide from their miscues against a fellow heavyweight
LOS ANGELES — Hey Yankees, you are not in Kansas City anymore.Or Cleveland.The lightweight portion of the postseason program is gone and on the other side of the World Series field is a mirror image of the Yankees — just one that plays the game cleaner.One certain to make the Yankees pay for transgressions in a way that the less star-studded, less powerful Royals and Guardians could not.The Yankees made mistakes in the field and on the bases and could not overcome it.
Not in the wall of noise that was Dodger Stadium in World Series Game 1.Not when the Yankees could survive a bottom-of-the-10th plate appearance by Shohei Ohtani and Mookie Betts and then the Dodgers still had Freddie Freeman to do a Kirk Gibson imitation.The Yankees had taken a 3-2 lead in the top of the 10th thanks in large part to Jazz Chisholm’s leg.
But Jake Cousins walked Gavin Lux with one out in the bottom of the inning.Tommy Edman then hit a grounder toward the middle.
Oswaldo Cabrera had come in to defend in the 10th after Gleyber Torres had been pinch-run for in the ninth.It was a tough backhand, but if Cabrera makes it, he gets an out somewhere.
But the ball trickled away from him.That brought up Ohtani with two on.Nestor Cortes, who had been put on the World Series roster after not pitching since mid-September due to an elbow injury, entered.
Ohtani sliced a ball toward the left-field line and Alex Verudgo made a sensational play lunging into the left field corner seats to catch it.But because he was out of play, the runners were allowed to move up a base.So Betts was walked to set up a lefty-vs.-lefty duel against Freeman.
The Dodgers first baseman had not played in two of the final three NLCS games against the Mets — both started by lefties — as he nursed a sprained right ankle.Los Angeles had won Game 1 of the 1988 World Series when Kirk Gibson homered to right field off Dennis Eckersley here at Dodger Stadium and then famously hobbled around the bases.Freeman crushed t...