Yankees keep World Series alive as bats awaken for Game 4 win over Dodgers

The Yankees still trail 3-1 in the best-of-seven Fall Classic but their flickering championship hopes will survive at least one more day. Game 5 is Wednesday night in the Bronx.

The Dodgers appeared bound for the first World Series sweep in 12 years from the top of the first inning, when Freeman drove a two-run shot off rookie starter Luis Gil into the short right-field porch, making him the first player to homer in the first four games of a Fall Classic. The 35-year-old first baseman and 2020 NL MVP set another record by homering in a sixth straight World Series game dating back to Atlanta’s last two games against Houston in 2021. The early salvo managed to deflate to the crowd while grabbing the attention of NBA star and fellow Angelino LeBron James, who shared his appreciation on social media.

But from there a dormant New York lineup that had batted a frigid .186 in the first three games while mustering a total of seven runs burst to life. After scratching one back on Alex Verdugo’s RBI grounder in the second inning, the Yankees loaded the bases against Daniel Hudson in the third and kicked down the door when Anthony Volpe launched a down-and-in first-pitch slider 390ft into the left-field bleachers. It was a childhood dream come true for the 23-year-old shortstop, who grew up a Yankee fan on Manhattan’s Upper East Side and attended their most recent World Series parade in 2009.

“I think I pretty much blacked out as soon as I saw it go over the fence,” said Volpe, who was New York’s first-round draft pick in 2019. “I think everyone had confidence in everyone in the lineup that someone was going to get the big hit. We’ve been having such good at-bats and putting such good swings on the ball, that we just felt like it was only a matter of time.”

Leading for the first time in the series since Game 1, when Freeman hit the first walk-off grand slam in World Series history, the Yankees held on as Tim Hill, Clay Holmes, Mark Leiter Jr, Luke Weaver and Tim Mayza combined to scatter one hit over five innings in relief of Gil, who ceded four runs on five hits in four innings of work. Down to three healthy starters, Los Angeles used a bullpen game for the fourth time in the postseason, with Ben Casparius allowing one run on one hit and three walks in two innings before Hudson entered and couldn’t keep Volpe in the park.

The Dodgers, who finished with six hits and went 1-for-7 with runners in scoring position, came within 6-4 in a two-run fifth that included a Will Smith homer and an RBI grounder by Freeman, who beat out a potential double play to get the run across. But Austin Wells and Gleyber Torres tacked on home runs for New York, who put the affair out of reach with a five-run eighth that sent the sold-out crowd of 49,354 into a state of euphoria.

“A lot of people getting in on the act was great,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said after New York’s highest-scoring World Series game in 46 years. “A lot of pitchers did really good things, really good defense. So good night for us and we’ll get another opportunity tomorrow.”

It didn’t take long for Tuesday’s contest to careen into the unexpected. Shortly after Freeman’s home run in the first, two spectators were ejected from the stadium after one pried the ball from the glove of Dodgers right fielder Mookie Betts as he attempted to make a play.

Betts leaped at the wall in foul territory and initially caught Torres’ pop-up in the bottom of the first, but a fan in the first row wearing a Yankees jersey grabbed the Los Angeles star’s glove with both hands and yanked the ball out. Torres was immediately called out on fan interference and the pair was escorted from the grounds shortly after by stadium security.

History suggests the Dodgers will be OK. None of the 24 previous teams to have faced a 3-0 deficit in the World Series have managed to extend it to a Game 6 much less come back to win. With Tuesday’s season-saving victory, the Yankees became the first team in 54 years, and fourth overall, to avoid a sweep and force a fifth game, joining the 1970 Cincinnati Reds, the 1937 New York Giants and the 1910 Chicago Cubs.

The only team in major league history to overturn a 3-0 deficit at any stage of the postseason were the Boston Red Sox against the Yankees in the 2004 American League Championship Series, a comeback that was sparked by now Dodgers manager Dave Roberts’ stolen base in Game 4.

The Yankees will send $324m ace Gerrit Cole to the hill on Wednesday night against the Dodgers’ Jack Flaherty in a rematch of Game 1. Suddenly it’s possible this much-hyped showdown between once-interborough rivals – their record-extending 12th World Series meeting but the first in 43 years – may be more than the gilded mismatch it appeared to be Tuesday morning.

“It’s going to take a lot,” Wells said. “No one has done what we’re trying to accomplish.”