SUMMARY
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HOUSTON, USA – Joc Pederson smashed a 3-run home run to power a 5-run final inning for the Los Angeles Dodgers to level the World Series by beating Houston 6-2 on Saturday, October 28.
Los Angeles equalized Major League Baseball’s best-of-seven final at 2-2 ahead of Sunday’s (October 29) game 5, ensuring the matchup will return to Los Angeles for game 6 on Tuesday, October 31.
Four Dodgers pitchers combined to toss a two-hit triumph, the fewest hits allowed to a team in a World Series game since 1995.
The Dodgers seek a 7th championship but their first since 1988 while the Astros are trying for the first World Series title in their 55-year history.
The Astros had been 7-0 at home in the playoffs this year, matching the best post-season start in major league history.
It was practically a must-win game for the Dodgers, since teams falling behind 3-1 in the Series have lost 84% of the time while those pulling level at 2-2 have won 45% of the time.
Dodgers first baseman Cody Bellinger had been 0-for-13 in the World Series with 8 strikeouts until he doubled in the 7th inning and scored on Logan Forsythe’s single to level the game 1-1.
Still deadlocked entering the 9th, Astros relief pitcher Ken Giles allowed a Corey Seager single, walked Justin Turner and gave up a double to Bellinger that scored Seager to put the Dodgers ahead to stay.
That ended Houston’s major-league record playoff run of more than 70 home innings without trailing.
Austin Barnes drove in another run with a sacrifice fly and Pederson followed with his homer to produce all the runs the Dodgers needed.
Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen surrendered a second hit, a homer by Alex Bregman, or Los Angeles would have boasted the first World Series one-hitter since 1967.
Dodgers left-handed starting pitcher Alex Wood and Astros right-hander Charlie Morton dominated the first 5 scoreless innings.
Wood baffled Houston batters through 5 2/3 hitless innings, the 26 year-old American left-hander sparking talk of the first World Series no-hitter since the 1956 perfect game by Don Larsen of the New York Yankees against the then-Brooklyn Dodgers.
But Houston’s George Springer blasted a 3-ball, 1-strike offering over the left-field wall in the 6th inning for a home run on the only hit Wood surrendered, giving the Astros a 1-0 lead and ending the Dodgers’ deepest no-hit bid in World Series history.
Morton surrendered one hit, a game-opening single by Chris Taylor, while striking out 7 in facing the minimum 15 batters over 5 innings.
Astros first baseman Yuli Gurriel was still playing in the World Series despite a racist gesture in the dugout on Friday, October 27 aimed at Japanese pitcher Yu Darvish of the Dodgers.
Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred gave Gurriel a 5-game ban at the start of the 2018 season for actions caught by television cameras rather than suspend him for any World Series contests. – Rappler.com
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