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Every World Series is memorable, but this was an all-timer. The Los Angeles Dodgers are the first repeat champs since the 1998-2000 New York Yankees (and the first NL team since the 1975-76 Cincinnati Reds) — I’m Levi Weaver, here with Ken Rosenthal. Welcome to (a special Sunday edition of) The Windup!

Epics: This game had everything

No offense to June baseball, which I also love. But in a normal month of June, you’ll get one or two moments that make you fully abandon all else, lean in and think, “Oh man, this is special.”

With apologies to Blue Jays fans, who — I dunno guys, you might just wanna skip this Windup, and just read Mitch Bannon here — there were so. many. moments last night that will warrant years of “Oh man, do you remember when ________?”

How often do we see the benches clear in Game 7 of a World Series? That happened in the fourth inning, when Justin Wrobleski hit Andrés Giménez after it appeared that Giménez had thrown a hand out in an attempt to get hit on the previous pitch.
Who takes the mound the day after he threw 96 pitches?! AND THEN THROWS 34 MORE PITCHES TO CLOSE OUT THE GAME?! Because Yoshinobu Yamamoto did that. Two days, two games, two wins, 130 pitches and a total of one run allowed on six hits. (And yes, he absolutely did earn World Series MVP for his efforts.)
We saw a veritable All-Star roster of pitchers in one game. All of these starting pitchers made appearances: Shohei Ohtani, Max Scherzer, Tyler Glasnow, Trey Yesavage, Shane Bieber, Blake Snell and Yamamoto. All in one game.
How about Miguel Rojas? On a Los Angeles roster of mega-stars, the No. 9 hitter launched a solo home run in the ninth to tie the game, then — with the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth — made a throw home to keep it tied, beating Isiah Kiner-Falefa by the slimmest of margins. Another two inches of speed by Kiner-Falefa, and the World Series would have ended on a replay review.
Remember one play later, when Andy Pages absolutely trucked Kiké Hernández to (also) save the World Series and send Game 7 to extra innings?
And then — a half-inning after Rojas’ throw —  almost the same scenario played out in the top of the 10th, with Andrés Giménez throwing out Mookie Betts to (for the time being) keep the Dodgers from taking the lead.
They did take the lead, though. Will Smith’s solo home run in the 11th gave the Dodgers a 5-4 lead for good. It was the first extra-innings home run in a winner-take-all Game 7 in MLB history.

And we didn’t even mention Bo Bichette’s three-run homer. Or the 41-year-old Scherzer allowing just one run over 4 1/3 innings, as he started the first World Series Game 7 since … he started the 2019 finale for the Washington Nationals (against now-teammate George Springer’s Astros).

Or Daulton Varsho’s immaculate catch in the fourth inning. Or Ernie Clement setting a record with his 30th hit in one postseason. Or Max Muncy’s eighth-inning home run to pull the Dodgers to within one. Or any number of brilliant defensive plays.

Those were, frankly, all too normal to get their own bullet point in a section about this absolutely bonkers Game 7. Just look at this win expectancy chart. Any time it starts looking like a heart monitor that late in the game … well, that’s pretty appropriate, actually.

More Game 7:

Leave it to Andy McCullough to encapsulate a game like that in just one story.
And of course, when a series gets weird and/or wild, nobody finds the little details like Jayson Stark.
Also, I absolutely love Patrick Dubuque’s prose. Here’s his recap over at Baseball Prospectus (free with a basic sub).
Ken’s Notebook: Dodgers showcase passion, perseverance and grit

TORONTO — Before the thrilling Game 7 that concluded one of the best World Series in recent memory, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts was pondering the meaning of grit.

Roberts said the best definition he heard was from researcher and podcaster Brené Brown. Actually, it was from psychologist Angela Duckworth. Whatever, Roberts liked the characterization, the description of grit as a combination of passion and perseverance for a singularly important goal.

“That is what this team exemplifies,” Roberts said.

You can despise the Dodgers for escalating their payroll to almost $400 million. You can despise them for cornering the market on Japanese stars. You can even accuse them of ruining baseball.

But after their 5-4 victory in 11 innings last night in Game 7 of the World Series, you have to admire the way they became the first back-to-back champions since the 1998 to 2000 Yankees.

With passion, perseverance and, yes, grit.

The Blue Jays were the better team for most of the Series. They outscored the Dodgers, 34-26. Held them to a .203 batting average. And in Game 7, led 3-0 after three innings and were two outs away from their first Series title since 1993.

Somehow, the Dodgers prevailed, becoming only the ninth team out of 32 to win Games 6 and 7 on the road in a best-of-seven World Series.

More on this in my latest column.

Rewind: Game 6 was dramatic, too

We haven’t even talked about Game 6, and buddy: That was also a pretty wild one.

There was Toronto starter Kevin Gausman, striking out eight Dodgers in the first three innings, but being undone by that third inning, when Betts — who had been dropped in the lineup, down to the cleanup spot — followed a Smith RBI double with a two-run single to make it 3-0 Dodgers.

But the bottom of the ninth is what we’ll remember.

We’ll remember the ball getting stuck below the pad in the wall, with Hernández and Justin Dean doing exactly what coaches tell outfielders to do if the ball is lodged under a pad: immediately put your hands up; it’s a ground-rule double. Doing so meant the Jays only had runners at second and third, rather than a run home and the tying run at third base.

I’ll be honest: As the final sands began to run out of the Game 6 hourglass, with Giménez at the plate, my mind started thinking back to 1993. (I wasn’t the only one.)

Ninth inning. One out. Two on. A guy who used to play for Cleveland at the plate. Baseball does love its symmetry from time to time — were we about to see Joe Carter II?

Nah, we got a double play to end the game: Dodgers 3, Blue Jays 1. So often a postseason hero with the bat, Hernández had his signature moment with the glove:

What a special series this was. (Again, not for Blue Jays fans. This was excruciating and heartbreaking, and they will never forgive the Dodgers for anything for the rest of time, as is custom in sports fandom.)

Handshakes and High Fives

Evan Drellich has a wild one: Inside the text messages of the agent who became a “mole” for Rob Manfred and MLB.

Meanwhile, federal investigators are probing a youth baseball arm of the MLBPA. So things are really going great in the off-field aspects of the sport.

I loved this: Sam Blum spoke to former umpire Dale Scott about what it’s like to ump a World Series Game 7.

Chad Jennings has our All Playoffs Team.

And let’s end it with one more Dodgers link: Here’s a collection of our stories from the Dodgers’ most pivotal moments in 2025.

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