Dodgers edge Giants in playoff thriller
SAN FRANCISCO — Cody Bellinger pointed at the dugout and pounded his chest in tri- umph after delivering the biggest hit this season for the defending World Series champions.
Of course, it took until the ninth inning of the 24th and final meeting to finally sepa- rate the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Francisco Giants.
They couldn’t have been any closer.
Bellinger hit a tiebreaking single in the ninth and prized midseason acquisition Max Scherzer came out of the bullpen for his first career save, sending the Dodgers past the Giants 2-1 in a thrill- ing winner-take-all Game 5 on Thursday night and into the NL Championship Series.
Bellinger’s line drive up the middle decided a scintillating Division Series between the top two teams in baseball with a combined 213 regular-season wins, adding a new chapter to this storied, century-old rivalry.
“We poured everything we could into this series and it took everything we had to beat these guys,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said.
The dramatic finish came with a disputed call: With a runner aboard, Scher- zer fanned Wilmer Flores on a checked swing for the final out. Plate umpire Doug Eddings checked with first base ump Gabe Morales, who ruled Flores swung. But on television replays, it appeared he held up.
“The umpire said it was a swing,” Bellinger said.
The Dodgers rushed out of their dugout to celebrate on the Giants’ home field. Fans began throwing beer cans and debris onto the diamond in disgust.
“Super tough. Obviously, you don’t want a game to end that way,” San Francisco manager Gabe Kapler said. “There’s no need to be angry about that. I just think it’s a disappointing way to end.
There are other reasons we didn’t win today’s baseball game, so that was just the last call of the game.”
Morales told a pool reporter that checked swings are one of the most difficult calls umpires have.
“I don’t have the benefit of multiple camera angles when I’m watching it live,” Morales said. “When it hap- pened live I thought he went, so that’s why I called it a swing.”
Mookie Betts had a postseason career-high four hits and will lead the next step in the Dodgers’ title defense at Atlanta for Game 1 of the best-of-seven NLCS on Saturday night. Roberts expects Scherzer to be ready to start, saying, “that’s the plan.”
Los Angeles came back from a 3-1 series deficit to beat the Braves in last year’s NLCS, taking Game 7 by a 4-3 score on the way to its first championship since 1988.
“It’s going to be another good one. It’s not going to be easy,” Bellinger said. “We played each other a few times the last few years. So we kind of know what each other’s got, and really looking forward to it.”
Camilo Doval plunked Justin Turner with one out in the ninth and Gavin Lux sin- gled before Bellinger came through with his most mean- ingful hit in a difficult season.
Before that single, he was 5 for 62 (.080) against the Giants in 2021.
“You really do want to be in that moment,” Bellinger said.
Scherzer, who lost his Game 3 start 1-0, came over from Washington at the July 30 trade deadline. He pitched a hitless ninth Thursday on two days’ rest to close out a best-of-five series certain to go down as a classic.
“That was crazy,” the 37-year-old Scherzer said. “To get the ball in that situation, man, that was a rush.”
The right-hander is the old- est to save a winner-take-all game since saves became an official stat in 1969.