LOS ANGELES — They couldn’t have scripted it much better.
The Dodgers rolled out the blue carpet again Friday night and received their 2024 World Series championship rings with all the pomp and pageantry you would expect. Then they went out and punctuated the occasion by coming from behind not once but twice, beating the Detroit Tigers, 8-5, on Mookie Betts’ second home run of the night, a three-run walk-off drive in the 10th inning.
The Dodgers’ unbeaten record survived Tanner Scott’s first blown save with the team and another two-run rally by the Tigers in the 10th inning. Betts gave them one lead with a solo home run in the eighth inning then won it with his 10th-inning homer.
As a member of the Tigers, Jack Flaherty did his best to throw a wet blanket on the occasion for his former teammates.
Flaherty held the Dodgers hitless into the fifth inning and scoreless through five.
At the same time, Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s splitter was nearly unhittable Friday – nearly.
Yamamoto threw 28 of them through five innings. The Tigers swung 14 times, missed 10, fouled off three and only put one in play.
But that one was a solo home run by Dillon Dingler in the second inning. Yamamoto gave up another solo home run on a fastball to Gleyber Torres in the third and left after five innings trailing 2-0 despite a career-high 10 strikeouts (eight on splitters).
Tommy Edman broke up Flaherty’s no-hit bid with a broken-bat flare into right field for a single with one out in the fifth, Flaherty hit Andy Pages to load the bases with two outs before getting out of the inning.
With one out in the sixth inning, Betts singled. Flaherty’s next pitch was a slider that stayed out over the plate. Freddie Freeman rode it out of the park for a two-run home run that tied the score.
The Tigers threatened to break the tie in the top of the eighth inning, loading the bases with two outs on a Spencer Torkelson double and back-to-back walks by Alex Vesia. But Vesia found his way back to the strike zone and struck out Dingler to escape.
Betts came up with two outs in the bottom of the eighth and jumped on a first-pitch fastball from Tigers reliever Will Vest. Maybe if he hadn’t been laid low by a stomach virus that had him living on smoothies and shedding weight for two weeks, Betts’ line drive would have landed somewhere deep in the left field pavilion. As it was, it just cleared the wall and survived a replay review for fan interference to give the Dodgers a 3-2 lead heading into the ninth.
Scott came in and gave up a leadoff single to former Dodgers prospect Trey Sweeney. After two ground balls, the Dodgers were ready to celebrate when Manuel Margot drove in the tying run with a single.
Riley Greene doubled down the right field line and it looked like Margot had scored the go-ahead run, despite stumbling as he rounded third base and being beaten to the plate by the throw. Austin Barnes made a lunging attempt to tag him while Margot veered wide and dove back toward home plate.
Initially called safe, Margot was ruled out after another replay review.
In the 10th, the Dodgers turned to veteran reliever Luis Garcia who made the team as a non-roster invitee this spring. Two ground balls moved the free runner to third base. The Dodgers intentionally walked Zach McKinstry, bringing Dingler up to the plate.
He sliced a soft fly ball toward the line in left field. Michael Conforto made a diving effort but came up empty and two runs scored on Dingler’s triple.
Conforto had better luck at the plate in the bottom of the inning. His ground-rule double drove in the Dodgers’ free runner and he scored on Will Smith’s pinch-hit single to tie the score.
After Shohei Ohtani singled, Betts worked the count full against Tigers reliever Beau Brieske then drove a changeup well into the left-field pavilion this time.
More to come on this story.