For the third time in four years, the Los Angeles Dodgers made it to the World Series. And now, that 32-year drought for the Los Angeles Dodgers is finally over! The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Tampa Bay Rays in Game six 3-1 and are now World Series Champions!
Clayton Kershaw, Kenley Jansen, Justin Turner, Cody Bellinger, Corey Seager, Austin Barnes, Walker Buehler, Joc Pederson, Kike Hernandez, Pedro Baez, Julio Urias, Chris Taylor, and Alex Wood all were on the in 2017 and 2018 team when they lost the World Series and they were all on the 2020 team that WON the World Series. This win means the most to those guys who experienced the highs and lows in the last four seasons. Additions of Muncy in 2018 and Rios, Kelly, Pollock, May and Smith in 2019, but the best move the Dodgers made was Mookie Betts in 2020.
A year unlike any other that has been dominated by a pandemic that continues to try to shut down the world and life as we once knew it. But there was no way Covid-19 could shut down the talent on the Dodgers roster. From top to bottom the lineup was deep and dangerous. The gloves and athletic abilities of Cody Bellinger and Mookie Betts will forever live in highlight reels. Corey Seager is a legend and the NLCS and WS MVP. Julio Urias is the future. Mookie will always be known as the game changer. The Dodgers never lost three games in a row all season. They scored in every game they played and rewrote the Dodger record books.
My twin brother and I were lucky enough to be able to fly to Texas and attend Game 3 of the World Series. An experience that well will never forget. It was weird that it was played in Arlington, Texas Globe Life Stadium with only 11 thousand fans were allowed and the weather was so cold and windy. But when you are surrounded by 10 thousand Dodger fans, Pantone 294 and Keg Sluggers stickers everywhere, it felt like a home game in LA.
The Dodgers lost game 4 due to errors, but the biggest error of the series was in Game 6 by Ray manager Kevin Cash. He pulled starting pitcher Blake Snell in the sixth inning based on analytics. Thanks, Cash! The Dodgers took full advantage and quickly took the lead 1-2. Mookie dropped a bomb to center field and it was 1-3 Dodgers in the 8th. With Urias on the mound, the Rays went three up and three down as the last two batters struck out looking. DODGERS WIN!
In pure 2020 fashion, all good things have to be ruined by Covid-19. Justin Turner tested positive during the second inning and then again during the 8th inning. He was pulled from the game and while his team was celebrating, he as was in Covid-19 jail. He insisted to be on the field with his team and he escaped from being in quarantine to join his team.
Bill Plaschke wrote in the Los Angeles Times “In the interest of common sense, millions of other Americans have been purposely absent for many deeply personal events, canceling weddings, postponing funerals, missing births. Justin Turner wouldn’t skip a trophy celebration.” A TROPHY CELEBRATION? Anyone with a partially functioning brain knows that winning the World Series is not reduced to a ‘trophy celebration’. This isn’t youth baseball where everyone in the league gets a participation trophy. THIS IS THE WORLD SERIES TROPHY. Holding THAT trophy is what these players play their entire careers for.
Turner suffered the back-to-back World Series losses and the meltdown last year to Washington in the NLDS. Lifting THAT trophy with his team meant everything to him and his teammates. JT deserved to be out there. His team wanted him out there. The fans wanted him out there. His teammates on the field were the only ones who are at risk, not the media a thousand miles away. This team and their families just spent the last month in a bubble isolated from everyone. They were literally confined to their hotel and the field.
Fans were not allowed to interact at all with the team or their families. No way anyone would react any different if it was them in Justin Turner’s shoes. Turner had no symptoms. If you just spent the last month in isolating conditions and in the middle of the biggest game of your life you get a positive Covid-19 test and are taken out of the game to then be are told you can’t celebrate the biggest win in your life with your team, tell me how would you react? You too would be out there with your team. What is another 15 minutes when you just spent the last month in close contact with each other?
Bill Plaschke continued to call the hometown kid selfish. However, I will continue to call Justin Turner a World Champion.
Now, Major League Baseball has launched an investigation about Turners actions? What is there to investigate? He was ‘asked’ not to go on the field, he did it anyway. What else is there to investigate about Justin Turner? The only investigation should be on the procedures of how MLB tested and how long the test took to come back as well as the accuracy of the test. If Turner gets ANY punishment for this while the well-known Astros cheaters got zero punishment, Rob Manfred will need to spend the rest of his life in quarantine. Test him again. Third times a charm for the Dodgers Worlds Series, I hope JT’s third test will be negative too.