The Los Angeles Dodgers came dangerously close to losing the World Series, a moment left fielder Kiké Hernández will not forget any time soon.
The Los Angeles Dodgers came within inches of losing Game 7 of the World Series to the Toronto Blue Jays when Toronto’s Ernie Clement launched a ball to left center that made Dodgers left fielder Kiké Hernández and center fielder Andy Pages give chase.
At that point, Los Angeles had just tied the game in the top of the ninth thanks to a Miguel Rojas solo shot, but the Blue Jays had runners in scoring position when Clement came to bat with two outs. Hernández and Pages collided into one another in their desperate attempt to keep the Dodgers’ chance at becoming repeat World Series champions alive.
Hernández fell to the ground and stayed there, not realizing that Pages made the catch to pull their team off the ledge and force extra innings. In a Dec. 14 appearance with LA AM570 Sports, Hernández reflected on the pivotal moment and believes he could have made the catch.
“No,” Hernández said when asked if he thought the ball would drop before the play was completed. “When I think about it now, when I look at it as one, I still think I could have caught it. I don't know why he jumped, but I'm just glad he caught it.”
Hernández thought the Dodgers had lost, until Pages let him know otherwise.
“I had my back towards the field and then I was stopping [and] slowing down to get, you know, I was basically underneath the baseball and the last thing I thought was going to happen was somebody was going to run me over. And as soon as he ran me over, I just I thought there was no way he was going to catch it.”
“You know, I was underneath the ball and he ran me over, so, we lost. And as I'm on the ground, I'm just thinking we just lost the World Series, and I'm laying on the ground. That's going to be replayed forever. And it's still being replayed forever.”
Before Pages’ iconic catch, the Dodgers came dangerously close to losing when Toronto’s Isiah Kiner-Falefa was thrown out at home plate, a play that had to be reviewed because of how close Kiner-Falefa's foot was to connecting with the plate before he was tagged. The Dodgers survived both instances and went on to win in the 11th inning after a Will Smith solo shot to left gave them a 5-4 lead that Yoshinobu Yamamoto would protect in his relief stint to cap off the heroics for the evening.