Freeman’s homer in 18th inning lifts Dodgers over Blue Jays 6-5 in World Series classic

“That could go down as one of the greatest games of all time,” manager Dave Roberts said.

Freeman drove left-hander Brendon Little’s full-count sinker 406 feet to straightaway center field, finally ending a baseball marathon that lasted 6 hours, 39 minutes, and matched the longest by innings in postseason history.

“Oh gosh, just pure excitement,” he said. “That’s as good as it gets.”

The only other World Series contest to go 18 innings was Game 3 at Dodger Stadium seven years ago. Freeman’s current teammate, Max Muncy, won that one for Los Angeles with an 18th-inning homer against the Boston Red Sox in a game that took 7 hours, 20 minutes.

It was Freeman’s second World Series walk-off homer in two years. The star first baseman hit the first game-ending grand slam in Series history to win Game 1 in 10 innings last season against the New York Yankees.

“This one took a little longer,” Freeman said. “But this game was incredible. Our bullpen was absolutely incredible.”

Will Klein, the last reliever left for the Dodgers, got the biggest win of his career. He allowed one hit over four shutout innings and threw 72 pitches — twice as many as his previous high in the majors.

“We weren’t losing that game,” Klein said, “and so I had to keep going back out there.”

Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who threw 105 pitches Saturday at Toronto in his second consecutive complete game, was warming up in the bullpen as Klein worked out of trouble in the top of the 18th.

“I don’t know how I kept going, but I just knew every inning that I went out there, it was going to be another zero. If I had to keep going out, there were going to be more zeros,” Klein said. “I was sitting at home in Arizona last month, you know? This is crazy.”

A total of 19 pitchers — 10 for the Dodgers — combined to throw 609 pitches in a game that ended at 11:50 p.m. on the West Coast. Three-time Cy Young Award winner Clayton Kershaw came out of the LA bullpen to escape a bases-loaded jam in the 12th, pitching in extra innings for the first time in his illustrious career.

“The Dodgers didn’t win a World Series today,” Blue Jays manager John Schneider cautioned. “They won a game.”

As the hours crept by, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. munched on an apple at the dugout railing. A staffer brought a fruit tray onto the bench and the Toronto slugger helped himself to another piece.

“We tried. We did everything we could. They did the same thing,” Guerrero said through a translator. “But in the end, they came away with the victory.”

Most fans in the crowd of 52,654 who stuck around were on their feet throughout, including 89-year-old Hall of Famer Sandy Koufax, and only sat down between innings.

Will Smith flied out to the left-center fence leading off the bottom of the 14th. Long drives by Freeman and teammate Teoscar Hernández also died on the warning track in extra innings, with the temperature dropping in Chavez Ravine as the night grew late.

Ohtani’s second solo homer tied it 5-all in the seventh. The two-way superstar, scheduled to start Game 4 on the mound Tuesday, also doubled twice and became the second player with four extra-base hits in a World Series game. Frank Isbell had four doubles for the Chicago White Sox in Game 5 against the Chicago Cubs in 1906.

After getting four hits in the first seven innings, Ohtani drew five consecutive walks — four intentional. That made him the first major leaguer in 83 years to reach base safely nine times in a game. Nobody else has done it even seven times in a postseason game.

“What matters the most is we won,” Ohtani said through a translator. “What matters the most is we flip the page and play the next game. … I want to go to sleep as soon as possible so I can get ready.”

Dodgers rookie Roki Sasaki induced consecutive groundouts with two runners aboard to end the eighth. He stranded two runners in the ninth, too, after second baseman Tommy Edman made a terrific defensive play for the second out of the inning.

Edman also threw out a runner at home plate to end the 10th on a perfect relay from Hernández in right field, as pinch-runner Davis Schneider tried to score from first on a double by Nathan Lukes.

“Crazy, crazy, crazy, crazy game,” Blue Jays starter Max Scherzer said.

With two outs in the Toronto seventh, Guerrero singled off reliever Blake Treinen and scored from first on Bo Bichette’s sharp single down the right-field line for a 5-4 lead.

The ball appeared to deflect off a television sound man along the low retaining wall in foul territory before caroming into shallow right field. Hernández’s throw home was wide, and Guerrero narrowly beat Smith’s tag by slapping the plate with his hand for a 5-4 lead.

Scherzer went 4 1/3 innings and became the first pitcher to appear in the World Series with four teams. His first Fall Classic came in 2012 with Detroit.

“We came out on the wrong side of this and it stings and it burns,” Scherzer said. “You want to win that game, but so proud of everybody’s effort.”

Home runs by Hernández in the second and Ohtani in the third staked the Dodgers to a 2-0 lead.

Toronto rallied with four runs — two unearned because of Edman’s error — to take a 4-2 lead in the fourth.

Alejandro Kirk hit a three-run homer off Dodgers starter Tyler Glasnow and dashed excitedly through the Blue Jays dugout holding their home run jacket. Andrés Giménez added a sacrifice fly before Glasnow completed a 29-pitch inning.

Los Angeles tied it at 4 in the fifth.

Kiké Hernández singled leading off against Scherzer and scored on Ohtani’s double to left-center off reliever Mason Fluharty. Ohtani came around on Freeman’s single down the right-field line.

Up next

Toronto RHP Shane Bieber makes his first World Series start and fourth of this postseason in Game 4 on Tuesday.

Ohtani hit three homers and struck out 10 batters over six-plus scoreless innings in Game 4 of the National League Championship Series against Milwaukee.

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/MLB

Beth Harris, The Associated Press

by The Canadian Press

Freeman’s homer in 18th inning lifts Dodgers over Blue Jays 6-5 in World Series classic

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