SI:AM | Yankees’ Fifth-Inning Collapse Will Live in Infamy

Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. I don’t think anything you’ll see this Halloween will be as scary as the Yankees’ fifth-inning defense. 

In today’s SI:AM: 

🤦‍♂️ The Yankees’ blunders
🏆 The Dodgers’ unexpected closer
🤔 Embiid’s odd injury situation

That was ugly

The Los Angeles Dodgers left no doubt as to who was the better team in this year’s World Series, capitalizing on a litany of New York Yankees mistakes in Game 5 on Wednesday to capture their first championship in a full season since 1988. For the Dodgers, it was confirmation of what had been clear all season—that they’re the best team in MLB. For the Yankees, it was a bitter defeat made even more unpalatable by how it occurred—with the season coming crashing down in one disastrous inning that’ll go down in postseason history. 

The Yankees didn’t really lose the series in the fifth inning of Game 5. A best-of-seven series has too many pivotal moments for one inning to be the deciding factor. You can point to other blunders like Juan Soto’s throwing error in the eighth inning of Game 1 that allowed Shohei Ohtani to advance to third and later score on a sacrifice fly, or manager Aaron Boone’s decision in the 10th inning of that game to bring in Nestor Cortes to pitch for the first time in a month only for him to surrender the first walk-off grand slam in World Series history. Or you can point to the Yankees’ generally languid offense in Games 2 and 3, in which New York batted a combined .145 and struck out 18 times. Those were the reasons why the Yankees fell behind 3–0 in the series, a hole that no team in World Series history—and only one team in the history of postseason baseball—had ever dug out of. 

Completing an unprecedented comeback from down 3–0 would have required the Yankees to play four games of basically flawless baseball against a team that finished with the best record in the majors this season. Instead, they played 13 great innings before the wheels fell off in spectacular fashion. 

The New York lineup came alive in an 11–4 victory in Game 4 to avoid a sweep and continued humming as the Yankees jumped out to a 5–0 lead in Game 5. Aaron Judge and Jazz Chisholm hit back-to-back homers in the first inning. Anthony Volpe stayed hot with a double to lead off the second and was driven home by Alex Verdugo, chasing starter Jack Flaherty in the process. Giancarlo Stanton led off the third with his seventh homer of these playoffs, breaking Alex Rodriguez’s franchise record for most home runs in a single postseason. Meanwhile, Gerrit Cole had not allowed a hit through four innings of work. Everything was humming along nicely and it appeared as though the series would be heading back to Los Angeles. 

But then the Yankees let it all slip away in one disastrous inning. Kiké Hernández led off the fifth with a single to break up Cole’s no-hit bid. Then Tommy Edman hit a routine liner to center that Judge inexplicably dropped. Will Smith hit a grounder to shortstop and Volpe attempted to get the lead runner at third, but his throw short-hopped Chisholm and everybody was safe. All of a sudden, the Dodgers had the bases loaded and nobody out. 

Cole buckled down, though, striking out Gavin Lux and Ohtani. He then got Mookie Betts to chase a slider away, grounding it softly to first, and it seemed for a split second that Cole would escape the inning unscathed. Only Cole didn’t cover the base. He pointed futilely for Anthony Rizzo to take it to the bag himself, but Rizzo was too far from the base and was expecting his pitcher to make the play, allowing the much faster Betts to reach safely. 

The blunder allowed the Dodgers to score their first run of the game. Freddie Freeman followed it up with a two-run single and then Teoscar Hernández drove in two more with a double to tie the game at 5–5. That big early lead had evaporated in a flash—without Cole allowing an earned run. 

“You give a team like the Dodgers a couple of extra outs, they’re gonna capitalize on it,” Judge said. “But it comes back to me. I’ve got to make that play, and probably the other two don’t happen.”

The mistake-filled inning wasn’t the reason the Yankees lost the series, but it did crush their hopes of a comeback. Getting swept would have been an embarrassment. Losing the way they did might have been worse, though. 

The best of Sports Illustrated

• The mistakes that plagued the Yankees in Game 5 were emblematic of the issues they faced all year, Stephanie Apstein writes.

• Apstein also wrote about how the Dodgers, despite their enormous payroll, felt like underdogs and embraced that identity en route to a hard-earned championship.

• Tom Verducci has some great background on how starter Walker Buehler came to be the man on the mound for L.A. at the end of the clinching game.

• Boise State players aren’t usually in Heisman Trophy consideration, but as Bryan Fischer explains, nothing about Ashton Jeanty’s football career has been typical.

• Here are our experts’ picks for every NFL game this week.

• Albert Breer doesn’t think the Texans are going to trade for a receiver to replace the injured Stefon Diggs.

• Chris Mannix doesn’t understand why the Sixers are being cagey about Joel Embiid’s knee injury.

• Elizabeth Swinton spoke with LSU basketball star Flau’jae Johnson about her team’s quest to win another national championship.

• The annual Georgia-Florida football game will be played in new cities in 2026 and ’27 while the usual site undergoes renovations.

• The Professional Women’s Hockey League is seeking to expand across North America.

The top five …

… things I saw last night: 

5. Aaron Judge’s leaping catch to rob Freddie Freeman of extra bases. How could he make a play like that and then drop an easy one in the next inning?
4. The scene in Los Angeles after the Dodgers won. 
3. The reaction from the students at Shohei Ohtani’s high school when he said hello to them during the postgame show. 
2. Aaron Boone’s reaction to Giancarlo Stanton’s home run live during an in-game interview.
1. This multi-angle view of the final out.