Memories, joyful and painful, last.
In the game 1 from last year’s World series Freddie Freeman hit the first Grand Off Grand Slam in the 120 -year History Fall Classic. The DODGER stadium immediately joined the list of indelible series-joe Carter in 1993, Kirk Gibson in 1988, Bill Mazeroski in 1960.
Five months later, the memories of participants remain alive.
“Hands-down the best sports moment I’ve ever witnessed,” said Los Angeles Dodegers Dave Roberts.
“I wanted to vomit,” said New York York Yankees Austin Wells.
This is followed by a description of the stunning turnover of events – leadership, moment and consequences – narrated by most of the words involved.
Knowledge
Yankees took the lead 3-2 at the top of the 10th shift. Their manager, Aaron Boone, was to make the decision to enter the lower half: which Reliever would use to face the bottom of the Dodgers order?
The right -hander Luke Weaver needed only 19 playgrounds to complete 1 2/3 of the perfect shifts, but Boone was wary that he sent him uphill for the third time. Instead, Boone went with another righteous, Jake Cousins, who got into the first and seconds, one out jam and raised the top of the Dodgers order, starting with Shohei era.
Enter the left player Nestor Cortes Jr., who did not give up in five weeks due to the tense flexor of the elbows. Boone believed that Cortes was an excellent possibility of Lefty Tim Hill, whose stroke rate in 2024 was the lowest among the relief leagues.
Boone (To beat the reporters the next day): I had no problem with Nestor even after this fact. I feel it was the right step with one out. The biggest thing was that (should) that I sent binding back to the third up? … That’s the one I struggled with.
Cortes: I was with Aaron Boone for five years. I know he trusted me enough. I guarantee that Aaron Boone always gave me the ball.
First Baseman Yankees Anthony Rizzo: MatchUp Tim Hill-Ohtani, I think the melts of 100 percent either place the ball on the ground or shoot it the other way around.
The double game at the end of the game was unlikely. During the regular season, the eating was only anchored at seven double games in 731 records and none during the postseason in 76 records. Boone also feared the potential match of Hill-Mocie Betts, which could follow.
The era swung on the first Cortese pitch, a fast ball 92 km / hv close to the heart of the zone, jumped up a pop -up foul. Yankees left Fielder Alex Verduugo to race to make a magnificent catching and fall into the left field stands.
YANKEES RELIER Clay Holmes: I remember sitting on the bench next to Gerrit (Cole). We brought Nestor. He got the first, pop -up window. And I was just like, “Man, this is just the icing up for the legend of Nestor and what he did.” It seems that in these types of moments the nestor always figures the way out and gets out of things.
The problem was that Verduugo left the field of the game. The judges ruled the dead ball and each runner advanced one base.
Verdugo (Then reporters): I didn’t know (rule). I still don’t know.
With an open base, Boone ordered a deliberate walk to Betts and set the left left match with Freeman.
Boone: Second and second, I wouldn’t go.
Betts: Actually, I wanted to swing. Because it’s like a kind of what you grow up and hope and dream of dreaming in World Series. I think I know it’s a game 1, maybe not a game 7, but a situation be a hero.
Freeman: I was excited for that moment. When you look at the video, I’m already in a box when Mookie is still taking off his stuff.
Roberts: It happened so fast. I was angry because Shohei didn’t do anything dramatic, as he had all year.
Fred Freeman (Freddie’s father): Everyone stood in Ballpark. I sat. I was so nervous, I couldn’t even stand.
Freeman did not run about a week before the series. But his ankle felt better when he ran out of the excavation to greeted his teammates during the show. And in the first shift he emerged three times, his first extra base in almost a month.
Fred Freeman: It was the first game he didn’t need ankle. He could put his leg without overturning. The day before he called me and said, “I got back.” I said, “You yes?” He said, “Yeah, I really have it.”
Dodgers Pinch-Runner Chris TaylorStanding on the third base: I felt really good. Freddie looked really good in our break in front of the world series. He was much better physically. And his swing looked back to his normal self.
Dodgers third Baseman Max Muncy: With Freddie you never expect home run. Somewhere you expect twice the gap.
Dodgers Catcher Will Smith: I was just waiting to hit the base of the back (opposite field). I saw him doing a hundred times.
Fred Freeman: That’s so bad to say, but my whole thing was, “Please don’t intervene.
Moment
Cortes threw Freeman a fast ball 92 km / h, down and inside, almost outside the plate.
Rizzo: You would think Freddie would see the playground because the era turned to the first pitch.
Wells: I was a little surprised that he got on the first rocking.
Cortes: It was enough, but low. And he is known to go in the opposite way. His game is a field of left center. So for him to turn on (turns on), I give him all the credit.
Freeman: I went against the grain of who I am. In this situation, I always try to hit the ball in the left center. I looked inside and stayed at the heater, because if I looked inside, I could (put it off) from the cutter and the slider away. Fortunately, he threw it where I looked.
Dodgers Shortstop Tommy Edman: I was on the second base, so I was a winning run, I just thought, “Find the way to score after Freddie hit the single.” It comes out of a bat, I immediately started to take a break and after hitting it, I was like, “Okay, I don’t have to run very hard. This is obviously a home run.”
Yankees reliever Tommy KahnleWho has already stood up: I was in the training room and watched the game with several boys. Before we even saw him throwing a playground on TV, we heard noise. We already knew what came. (The average delay in the broadcast is seven seconds.) I didn’t even look at it. I just got up and went into my locker.
Coach Dodgers First Base Clayton McCullough: When he left his bat, I knew it was Homer. You know the trajectory, sound. I darkened something.
Dodgers jug Tyler Glasnow: No one really knew what to do. Everyone just lost a little conscious thoughts. I remember how I looked at (Michaela) kick and everyone was like, “What are we doing?”
Fred Freeman: I couldn’t believe it had happened. I sat next to (film and television producer) Burt Sugarman and (television personality) Mary Hart. He pounds my back and said, “I knew he could,” something like that. And then Alma came and jumped into my arms. (Alma Freeman is Fred’s wife and Freddie’s stepmother; Freddie’s mother Rosemara died of melanoma when he was 10)
Freddie Freeman, usually Stoic, held the bat high when he walked up along the first base line and made his own version of the microphone and bent between the second and third. The moment was katartic, more ways than one.
At the end of July the youngest of Freeman‘With three sons, Max, 3, they were diagnosed with Guillain-Barré syndrome, a rare neurological condition in which the immune system of the body attacks its nerves. Max went to a temporary paralysis. Was placed on the fan. At the beginning of the series he was on his way to full recovery.
Freeman: I’m no one to do anything after home runs. But it was almost like the culmination of the last three months that the Freeman’s family went through. All grind, sorrow, everything just came out. My wife was there and my children were there. My dad was sitting in the front row. I don’t know what came to me. I just knew he was there, and I just ran over. Everyone asks me what you told him. I didn’t say anything. I just screamed in his face.
Fred Freeman: Shout. He didn’t say a word. He just screamed and I screamed a little. And then he tried me a little.
Freeman: It was about an hour interview in about two seconds of shouts.
Aftermath
Rizzo: It hits this home run and you have the same way, “Oh, God.”
Holmes: It was a huge shock. There was just silence for a good minute.
Wells: I don’t even remember the crowd. I don’t remember the noise. I was just dull.
Kahhn: It was definitely not great 10 minutes after the game. The good thing we had in the team older people. Rizzo was great, really good in keeping us forward, looking forward to moving forward and not doing what had just happened.
Rizzo: It wasn’t like a call. It was just a few words. “We’re good. It was a great game. I hope they enjoyed the moment. It was quite cool we had just experienced.” It is a loss of intestine, especially leadership. However, we lost Gut-Wrenchers throughout the year. It was nothing we hadn’t seen before. And we usually reacted quite well.
But the series has never been the same.
Dodgers won Game 2, 4-2, Freeman hit one of the three Homer of Carlos Rodon and Yoshinobu Yamamoto, allowing only one run in 6 1/3 of the shift. They also won Game 3, 4-2, while Freeman hit another Homer and Walker Buhler, who excited five shifts. Yankees surpassed another Freeman Homer for the victory of 11-4 in the game 4, but then came their infamous game 5 when they melted in the fifth exchange and lost 5-0 leadership, falling, 7-6.
The question persists: If not for Freeman Walk-Off Slam, could things show differently?
Wells: It changed the whole world series. Equally simple.
Cortes: We win the game 1 – which we should have – we lost 2 and 3, we won the game 4 and we were supposed to win the game 5. Then we return to LA, up to 3 to 2.
Rizzo: You can’t let one loss destroy all your morality. Because of course it could have. And of course we lost (series), so it’s easy to say yes. I think they will appear the next day, we had a chance to win the game 2.
Freeman: I would like to say that we would still win the series because we had a really good team and played a really good baseball. But you don’t know.
Blacksmith: It would be much harder to win.
Roberts: If we lose the game 1, I think the series goes seven games. As we all know, the game 7 is a coin flip.
AthleticThis story was contributed by Brendan Kuty, Tyler Kepner, Will Sammon, Cody Postedhagen and Chris Kirschner.
(Best photo of Freeman in Game 1 from 2024 World Series: Keith Birmingham / Medianews Group / Pasadena Star-Nes
