Dodgers look to win World Series
Game 5 of the World Series is no longer a bugaboo for Clayton Kershaw.
On Sunday night, he flirted with another rough one but eventually turned in a winning performance — his first in three such career attempts — to move the Los Angeles Dodgers to within one victory of the 2020 World Series.
“I’m very excited,” Kershaw told Fox Sports post-game. “But at the same time, we’ve got to win one more game, so I’m going to keep it together for one more game.
“We’re going to win one more.”
The Dodgers won this one 4-2 in part because of Kershaw’s effort to push back the pesky Tampa Bay Rays in Game 5 at Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas.
It was in stark contrast to his previous Game 5 appearances of Major League Baseball’s championship finale.
In 2017, Kershaw got lit up by the Houston Astros — who were later branded as cheaters for their sign-stealing scheme in that Fall Classic. That Game 5 saw him get leads of 4-0 and 7-4, but he allowed six runs before leaving the affair in the fifth inning, and the Dodgers went on to lose 13-12 in an extra inning. Three nights later, the Astros won — with an asterisk — the crown.
Then a year later in Game 5 of the 2018 World Series, the Boston Red Sox got two runs on him in the first inning and one more in each of the sixth and seventh frames to chase starter Kershaw en route to the title that evening.
They are two reasons why Kershaw is atop MLB’s list for the most post-season innings pitched (183.1) without a World Series honour to call his own.
Just as he was in a firstgame win back in 2017, Kershaw sparkled and got the result he wanted in Game 1 this year.
But just like three years ago in Game 5, he wasn’t as sharp Sunday night as in Game 1, especially early, when he allowed the lead-off hitter in each of the first four innings to reach safely.
And it eventually cost him in the third inning, when Kevin Keirmaier, Yandy Diaz — with a triple — and Randy Arozarena hit safely in consecutive at-bats to put up two runs.
“It was a grind,” Kershaw told Fox Sports. “I didn’t have my stuff like I did in Game
1 — my slider wasn’t near as good as it was. Fortunate to get through there.”
In the meantime, though, Kershaw got help from his friends, as the Dodgers hitters got to Rays starter Tyler Glasnow early and often, just as they did in Game 1.
Mookie Betts, with a leadoff double, and Corey Seager, with an RBI-single, got the Dodgers on the board in the top of the first inning. Seager then stole second and came home on Cody Bellinger’s infield hit for a quick 2-0 Dodgers advantage.
And it didn’t get any better in the second for Glasnow, when Joc Pederson powered an offering over the fence for a third Dodgers run.
The fourth inning proved to be a turning point for Kershaw, when — with a tenuous one-run lead — he worked his way out of a jam after Manuel Margot reached third on a walk, a stolen base and an error before the inning’s first out. After walking Hunter Renfroe, he got Joey Wendle to pop out, Willy Adames to strike out and threw out Margot at home when he brazenly tried to steal home.
“It’s happened to me at least one other time that I can remember,” Kershaw told Fox Sports of the attempted steal of home by Margot. “I work on that with the first basemen. I’ll say, ‘I’ll look at them originally, but if they break, you’ve got to say something.’ I know now to just step off fast and throw it (home). It’s something that doesn’t happen a lot.”
What followed was insurance by Max Muncy, as he no-doubted a Glasnow pitch into the right-centre-field stands in the fifth inning to make it 4-2 Dodgers.
The Rays went 1-2-3 in their half of the fifth, and Kershaw made short work of the first two batters in the sixth before giving way to reliever Dustin May.
Kershaw finished with six strikeouts while scattering five hits and surrendering two walks and two runs.
May proved effective himself until the eighth-inning lead-off man, Keirmaier, got on with a single. And May’s replacement, Victor Gonzalez, got in trouble by walking Mike Brosseau to bring the potential go-ahead run to the plate, but turned aside the Rays’ two most dangerous bats — Arozarena and Brandon Lowe — to keep the tworun lead intact.
Stopper Blake Treinen then came in for the save in the final inning, allowing Margot to reach with a lead-off single but no more, to line the Dodgers up for the World Series take on Tuesday night.
“I think it’s just about believing in these guys,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts told Fox Sports when asked about throwing his young pitchers out there in relief. “It’s been a rocky road for those guys a little bit the last couple of outings. They made me look good.
“I’m proud of our guys.” Following Monday’s day off, the World series resumes with Game 6 tonight and Game 7 — if the Dodgers don’t win it all tonight — going Wednesday. Blake Snell (2-2, 3.33 ERA in the 2020 post-season) should get the call to start for the Rays tonight.