Dodgers fans want this blue streak to end
After 29 long years, the faithful hope another title is near.
With the crack of a bat, they exploded. Out of seats, fists in the air, mouths agape — one screaming, hugging, high-fiving, euphoric mass of Dodgers fans.
It was the bottom of the ninth. Two outs. Tied game, 1-1. Justin Turner stepped to the plate Sunday night and smacked a three-run home run over the center field wall, lowering the boom on the Chicago Cubs in Game 2 of the National League Championship Series — leaving the Boys in Blue just two wins shy of their first World Series in 29 years.
Oh, what a time to be a Dodgers fan.
Derek Guerra ran through the crowded corridors of Dodger Stadium high-fiving as many people as he could find as the stadium convulsed with applause. He was just a toddler when his mom brought him to the ballpark for the 1988 World Series — the game in which Kirk Gibson hit his dramatic walk-off home run, a swing of the bat that seemed to lift the entire city.
“I was 2 years old! I was 2 years old!” Guerra, now a 31year-old San Gabriel Valley resident, screamed, barely able to contain his joy. “This is my dream! We’re almost there.”
Over the loudspeakers, Dodgers organist Dieter Ruehle played “Closing Time” by Semisonic:
Closing time. Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.
Alexis Rivera, 25, of San Fernando had already started losing her voice. She had been yelling almost non-
stop since Turner’s home run.
“I’ve been high-fiving everyone,” she said. “Even Cubs fans, rubbing it in their faces.”
Like so many in the sellout crowd of 54,479, Rivera said that after a 29-year World Series drought, this season feels different.
“I feel like this is our year,” Rivera said.
Many believe it. Some holler it. And with the championship series now moving to Chicago, others only hint at it, leery of jinxing it all.
Like any good baseball fan, Cesar Melgoza is properly superstitious. Which might explain why he brought along what he hoped would be an unlucky charm for the Cubs: a stuffed goat, a la the Curse of the Billy Goat, said to have kept the Cubs from winning the World Series for decades.
“I’m trying to start a new curse for the Cubs,” Melgoza said.
This year, the Cubs are the defending World Series champions, but Melgoza is undeterred. His goat held a handmade sign: “I’m baaaack! From the dead. Go Dodgers!!!”
Melgoza also is Catholic. Attending a ballgame on a Sunday, he wore a string of blue rosary beads. It had a silver Dodgers mitt attached.
Lynwood Councilwoman Aide Castro, 40, happened to be in the restroom during Turner’s home run. She said there was a loud, collective “Awww!,” everyone in the women’s room suddenly aware they’d missed something special. They could hear the crowd going crazy outside.
Castro, too, is superstitious.
“From now on, I have to go to the bathroom every time,” she said, laughing.
Emma Tarin, a shy, petite 9-year-old from Rancho Cucamonga, is about as big a Dodgers fan as they come. On Sunday, she wore a Corey Seager jersey and a Dodgers cap over her long blond hair. She wore a Dodgers watch, Dodgers bracelet, Dodgers earrings, Dodgers necklace. Her socks? Dodger blue.
She said she has a picture of Joc Pederson on her bedroom wall. Vin Scully, too.
Her dad, Jeff Tarin, a 36year-old boat salesman from Rancho Cucamonga, passed on his lifelong love of the team to his daughter. He’s been thrilled to share this season with her, and — with any luck — the World Series to come.
“Dave Roberts is a genius this year with the rotation,” he said of the Dodgers’ manager. “He’s an amazing, amazing man, and there’s going to be a statue for him here someday.”
Chris Nieto, 37, of San Dimas wore a Turner jersey and a smile on his face.
“This is the greatest Dodgers game I’ve ever been to,” he said. “I’ll never forget this game for the rest of my life. Bottom of the ninth. Two outs. We went crazy. Dodger Stadium’s just one of those places that, in the playoffs, it’s just magic.” Nieto’s voice cracked. “I cried today,” he said. “It was magical today.”
‘I’ve been high-fiving everyone. Even Cubs fans, rubbing it in their faces.’ — Alexis Rivera, 25, of San Fernando, who’d been yelling almost nonstop since Justin Turner’s home run