The World Series begins tonight. This yearly matchup of the American League and National League champions has become the culmination of a seemingly endless series of qualifying rounds, leaving nerves frayed and pocketbooks light for fans of the surviving two. At this point, even surviving all the way to the World Series feels like the reward for a life well-lived.
This year features two of baseball’s most iconic franchises, the New York Yankees and the Los Angeles Dodgers. These teams bring with them long pedigrees of postseason heroics, both historically and in the current moment. As a native Angeleno and lifelong Dodger fan, I have no qualms about where my sympathies lie despite two decades of residence in the Big Apple. Besides, as comedian Joe E. Lewis once observed, “Rooting for the Yankees is like rooting for U.S. Steel.”
Hmm. Perhaps my historical references are a bit out of date. Anyway, my faith in the Dodgers is as sure as Sears.
The Yankees, of course, are the sport’s undisputed leader when it comes to World Series appearances and wins: Since they traded for a young pitcher-turned-slugger named Babe Ruth more than a century ago, they have appeared in the Fall Classic 41 times and won 27, featuring in the meantime some of baseball’s most famous dynasties: World Series lore is littered with the exploits of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Derek Jeter and more. The Dodgers—in Brooklyn and Los Angeles—have made it to the World Series 20 times and won seven. Part of the reason for their low winning percentage? In 11 of those series, they played the Yankees—and lost eight times.
However, the Yankees and Dodgers are hardly great archrivals anymore; they haven’t met in the World Series in more than 40 years. Let’s put it this way: Fernando Valenzuela, who died this week at 63 years of age, was a 20-year-old rookie in that last matchup. Plus, the Red Sox will always be the Yankees’ bête noire.
For the Dodgers, that title belongs to the San Francisco Giants (let us not forget Juan Marichal hitting John Roseboro with a baseball bat), though in recent years the Dodgers have consistently gotten the better of their poorly monikered little adversaries to the north. The San Diego Padres have also proven a pretty worthy nemesis these past couple of seasons, especially with their trio of overpaid braggarts in Manny Machado, Jurickson Profar and steroid enthusiast Fernando Tatis Jr. Enjoy Cancun, fellas!
And of course, what decent human being baseball fan doesn’t skeeve the Houston Astros, whose cheating ways hurt all of baseball but no one more than the Dodgers?
Still, you know this series is the matchup Major League Baseball was dreaming of (and not just because resale prices are well over $1,000 for standing-room-only tickets). Two storied franchises, two massive media markets, two teams the rest of the world loves to loathe, half a dozen future Hall of Famers, rosters stacked with international stars—the only thing that’s missing is an inciting incident to make things spicy. And these are two fan bases happy to provide reasons for people to hate them.
So what to expect in this first matchup of Goliath v. Goliath since 1981? Here are five factors to watch for:
1. The bullpen
The Dodgers have terrible starting pitching at the moment, an anomaly for a team that historically has relied on its hurlers rather than hitters (Bob Costas once famously described the Dodger team that won the 1988 World Series as “the weakest lineup to ever take the field for a World Series game”). They’ve been saved over the past month by Blake Treinen and the rest of a reliever corps that has been close to untouchable at times, including an almost-unprecedented “bullpen game” (don’t ask) shutout earlier in the playoffs. If relief mainstay Alex Vesia can come all the way back from injury, they could be even better.
The Yankees seemed to have both a solid starting rotation and an elite relief corps, but their bullpen suffered an epic ninth-inning collapse against the Cleveland Guardians in the American League Championship Series. A minor hiccup, or an Achilles’ Heel? They have a big advantage over the Dodgers in terms of starters, but you can bet all eyes will be on that relief corps if this series goes long and the Yankees’ starters are only available on short rest.
2. The unsung heroes
Both teams have their modern-day incarnations of “Murderers’ Row.” The Dodgers have Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman atop the order; the Yankees counter with Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Juan Soto. All six of these sluggers are on their way to the Hall of Fame. But the most valuable players for both teams in the last few weeks might have been their unsung Johnny Six-Packs.
For the Yankees, two-bagger Gleyber Torres has been hitting well in the leadoff slot, setting the plate for the aforementioned big bats. But another unexpected source of production has been Anthony Volpe, the Gold Glove shortstop with the anemic batting average. Volpe, who never met a pitch he couldn’t swing at and miss, has turned the corner in the postseason, hitting .310 with a .459 on-base-percentage. And he’s walked more than he’s struck out!
For the Dodgers, Tommy Edman has been a revelation. He hadn’t played a game all year before the Dodgers picked him up from the St. Louis Cardinals at mid-season. But he batted cleanup for much of the National League Championship Series—that’s right, a guy who drove in 20 runs this year was batting cleanup—and won the Most Valuable Player award for the series. He drove in 11 runs in the NLCS alone. Teoscar Hernández (usually another strikeout machine) and catcher Will Smith have been delivering big hits too. Kiké Hernández has once again leaped into a phone booth to emerge as a postseason Superman.
This series might be won by the guys on one-year contracts, not by the ones on Murderers’ Row Billionaires’ Row.
3. Nerves
For all their storied history, in the last 15 years these two franchises have won exactly one World Series between them—the Dodgers in 2020. Both teams make the playoffs essentially every single year, but both have also been notoriously bad at closing the deal.
Dodgers’ manager Dave Roberts has the highest winning percentage in baseball history, but it’s not inconceivable that he could be fired if this team loses. How can that be? Because the Dodgers have blown too many big postseason games in his tenure. The Yankees are in the same boat: Since they won the World Series in 2009, they’ve advanced to the playoffs 11 times…and never once reached the World Series.
That history weighs on both teams, and that’s just talking about the veterans and the managers. Some of these guys, Shohei Ohtani included, are experiencing the playoffs for the first time this year. We can expect both Chavez Ravine and the Bronx to be intimidatingly loud and rowdy for every game of this series. Add in two demanding fan bases watching from home that expect nothing short of the crown, and…we might see some Nervous Nellies out there.
4. Mother Nature
Over the years, baseball has added three additional rounds of play to the postseason previous to the World Series—a three-game Wild Card series, a five-game Divisional Series and a seven-game League Championship Series. This means that the World Series has extended beyond October eight different times, all in the past quarter-century. If Reggie Jackson were playing today, we might be calling him “Mr. November” (Dave Winfield, of course, would remain “Mr. May”).
The Dodgers have the home-field advantage in this series, hosting the Yankees for the first two games in broken-down old dump Ebbets Field storied Dodger Stadium tonight and tomorrow. We can expect the weather to be typical Southern California perfect for both games—and the 5 p.m. starts to accommodate East Coast TV viewers will mean the Yankees will be dealing with some bewildering Dodger Stadium shadows they’re not accustomed to as the sun goes down.
But then the series will shift to Yankee Stadium in the Bronx for Games Three, Four and (if needed) Five, all of them starting past 8 p.m. Anyone who’s ever been to Yankee Stadium in the fall knows it gets downright freezing at night. Will the Dodgers be prepared for chilly New York temps or even—it’s happened before—snow?
5. Amazing Grace
“If you don’t love the Dodgers,” longtime Los Angeles manager Tommy Lasorda used to say, “there’s a good chance you may not get into heaven.” I don’t disagree—it’s right there in the Bible—but I’m also never sure from year to year that God doesn’t dislike the Blue Crew more than a little. How else to explain more than a decade of dominance in which the Dodgers have blown their chances to bring home the trophy 11 times out of 12?
On the other hand, no believer could imagine the New York Yankees being God’s most beloved. Imagining so is like wishing Pope Francis would sell the Sistine Chapel to Elon Musk for use as a garage, like watching “Lord of the Rings” and hoping Frodo keeps it in the end. No, God is clearly on the Dodgers’ side this year. Plus, we have a secret weapon: the intercession of Blessed Vin Scully, the Voice of God himself during his 67 years as the Dodgers announcer.
Yankees Go Home! Dodgers in six.
