The Yankees, seemingly cruising to a second straight victory Thursday that would have made the World Series interesting after three straight Dodgers victories, instead made things interesting in the fifth inning.
A single and back-to-back errors loaded the bases for Los Angeles. From there, though, starting pitcher Gerrit Cole (2024 salary: $36 million) managed to strike out Gavin Lux and Shohei Ohtani, the latter of whom is earning $70 million this season on a rigged, back-loaded deal even if it only shows up as $2 million officially this season.
At that point, the bases were loaded with two outs, and the Yankees were up 5-0. Mookie Betts ($30 million this year) was at the plate. He hit a routine ground ball to first that was destined to end the inning. But Anthony Rizzo was too casual with it. Cole didn’t cover first. And Betts sprinted out of the box, knowing what was at stake, and improbably won the race to the bag.
It was great hustle and awareness from Betts, the sort of random play that makes baseball wonderful. And of course, Freddie Freeman ($27 million this season) followed with a two-run single. Teoscar Hernandez ($23.5 million) hit a two-run double, and next thing you know, the game was tied.
Betts, who a night earlier had been accosted in right field as two Yankees fans ripped a ball from his glove, got the last laugh when his sacrifice fly in the eighth was the championship-winning run in a 7-6 victory.
There were five compelling games between two star-studded teams.
The entire series was also an extreme reminder that baseball’s financial system is a farce, which unfortunately made it one of my least favorite World Series of all time — something I talked about on Thursday’s Daily Delivery podcast.
Both teams had payrolls above $300 million this season if we (correctly) add $68 million to the Ohtani total, meaning they were among the three biggest-spending teams this year. Every World Series winner since 2018 has had a payroll in baseball’s top 10, and three times it was the biggest spender that won (including this year’s Dodgers if we factor in all their backloaded compensation). The top six spenders this year were all among MLB’s 12 playoff teams.
