2024 World Series: Yankees vs. Dodgers

Freddie Freeman couldn't run all week. The first time he jogged was when they called his name for player introductions before Game 1, and he trotted out to the baseline on an ankle he'd badly injured in late September, waved to the Dodger Stadium crowd, and then went back to the dugout to sit down. And five days later he was World Series MVP.

That's the 2024 World Series. The New York Yankees finally ended their fifteen-year drought -- the journey covered in the companion piece on how they got here -- and the Dodgers beat them in five games anyway. Freddie Freeman, operating on one good ankle, hit four home runs and drove in 12 runs in five games. He tied a record that had stood since Bobby Richardson did it in 1960 -- in seven games. Freeman did it in five.

The Yankees outscored the Dodgers 24-25 for the series. Twenty-four runs. They weren't getting blown out. They just couldn't get the one out, the one hit, the one play when it mattered most.

Game 1: The Grand Slam That Shouldn't Have Happened

Gerrit Cole was brilliant. Six innings, one run, four strikeouts, zero walks. He gave the Yankees everything they could have asked for in a World Series opener. Jack Flaherty held his own until Giancarlo Stanton turned on one in the sixth inning -- a two-run shot that put the Yankees up and had the Bronx believing.

It stayed that way deep into extras.

Then in the bottom of the tenth, Aaron Boone did the thing. Two on, one out, the Yankees needing ONE out to stay alive. Mookie Betts at the plate. Boone walked him intentionally -- loading the bases, taking the lefty matchup Nestor Cortes gave him against Freeman -- and waved Freeman up to hit. The guy who couldn't run. The guy playing on an ankle that his doctor probably wasn't thrilled about. The guy whose week of treatment had culminated in a gentle introductory jog ninety minutes earlier.

Cortes threw a 92.5 mph first-pitch fastball.

Freeman hit it 413 feet into the right-field seats.

Walk-off grand slam. The first walk-off grand slam in World Series history. Dodgers 6, Yankees 3. And just like that, one pitch, one at-bat, one decision set the tone for everything that followed -- Yankees fans will argue the intentional walk for the next decade. (Did Boone have a choice? Maybe not. Freeman is one of the best hitters alive. But in retrospect, you're telling the baseball gods: here, take your best shot. And they did.)

Game 2: Yamamoto Makes It Look Easy

Yoshinobu Yamamoto had a rough first inning -- 21 pitches, a little shaky, the Yankees hitters poking at him looking for a pattern. Then he found it. He retired the last 11 batters he faced and finished with 6.1 innings of one-hit ball. The only hit was Juan Soto's solo home run, which means the Dodgers' $325 million pitcher allowed exactly one hit and it didn't even cost him the game.

Carlos Rodón had no such luxury. He lasted 3.1 innings, gave up four earned runs, and surrendered three home runs -- all on fastballs. (Three home runs on fastballs. In a must-win game. Against the Dodgers. It was like watching a car accident in slow motion.) Teoscar Hernández and Freddie Freeman hit back-to-back blasts in the third inning. Freeman homering in consecutive games for the second time in two nights. Dodgers 4, Yankees 2. Series now 2-0.

The psychological damage was real. The Yankees had gone from "that grand slam was fluky" to "we can't score against these people."

Game 3: Buehler at the Stadium, Series on the Brink

Walker Buehler came into Yankee Stadium and threw five shutout innings -- two hits, five strikeouts, 76 pitches. The guy who'd been a question mark all season looked like October Buehler again. (His career World Series ERA coming in was 0.50 in 18 innings. He was annoyingly good at this.)

Clarke Schmidt lasted 2.2 innings, walked four batters, and gave up three runs. Freeman led off the first inning with a home run -- his third consecutive game, another record falling -- and the Yankees never really threatened after that. Down 3-0 in the series. No team in World Series history had ever come back from 3-0. The Stadium was quiet in a way that felt wrong, like the crowd was trying to process something that didn't quite make sense yet.

Dodgers 4, Yankees 2.

Game 4: One Night, Full Bats, All of It

Anthony Volpe hit a grand slam in the third inning. Then he doubled. Then he stole two bases. He became the first player in World Series history to hit a grand slam AND steal two bases in the same game, which sounds like something you make up to win a bar bet but actually happened.

Luis Gil started and kept the game manageable. Gleyber Torres broke it open with a three-run homer in the eighth. Yankees 11, Dodgers 4 -- a blowout, a catharsis, the kind of game that makes you think: there it is, THAT'S the team, where has this been?

Freeman homered again (four consecutive games, first player ever), but this time the Yankees didn't care. They had nine runs to spare.

Series at 3-1. Twenty-four hours later, every Yankees fan had convinced themselves a comeback wasn't just possible but inevitable.

Game 5: The Fifth Inning

Aaron Judge and Jazz Chisholm Jr. hit back-to-back home runs off Jack Flaherty in the first inning. Stanton went deep off Ryan Brasier in the third. Yankees up 5-0, Cole dealing, Yankee Stadium shaking. Flaherty was gone before the third inning was over, having recorded just four outs. It was starting to feel like it, like the thing that shouldn't have been possible was happening anyway.

Then the fifth inning happened.

Three miscues. That's it. Three freakin' miscues. Judge dropped a fly ball in center field. Volpe booted a grounder at short. Cole failed to cover first base on a Mookie Betts grounder -- the play where the pitcher drifts toward the bag and you see it about to go wrong and there's nothing you can do about it. Those three plays, none of them earned runs, opened the door for five Dodgers runs. Freeman hit a two-run single. Hernández hit a two-run double. Tied 5-5. Cole had thrown 38 of his 108 pitches in that one inning.

He pitched through it. 6.2 innings total, five runs, zero earned. His series ERA was 0.71 -- one earned run in 12.2 innings across two starts. He pitched his guts out and it still wasn't enough, and if that doesn't break your heart a little, I don't know what does.

Stanton's sacrifice fly put the Yankees up 6-5 in the sixth, and for a while it looked like the defense might be forgiven. Then the eighth inning. Gavin Lux sacrifice fly. Mookie Betts sacrifice fly off Luke Weaver. Dodgers 7, Yankees 6. Walker Buehler came on for the ninth and struck out Alex Verdugo to end it, and the Dodgers poured onto the Yankee Stadium field.

I've already experienced it. One or two things go differently, and nobody's talking about it. Since you lose, everyone's talking about it.

He's right, technically. But "one or two things" in Game 5 includes an error by the best player in baseball, which is the part that makes it stick.

Frequently Asked Questions

What happened in Game 1 of the 2024 World Series?

The Yankees held a lead late before the Dodgers tied it and sent the game to extras. In the bottom of the tenth inning, with the bases loaded, Aaron Boone intentionally walked Mookie Betts to set up a lefty-on-lefty matchup with Freddie Freeman. Reliever Nestor Cortes threw a 92.5 mph first-pitch fastball, and Freeman hit it 413 feet for a walk-off grand slam -- the first walk-off grand slam in World Series history. Dodgers 6, Yankees 3.

Who was the 2024 World Series MVP?

Freddie Freeman of the Los Angeles Dodgers. He batted .300 with four home runs and 12 RBI in five games, becoming the first player in World Series history to homer in each of the first four games of a series. His 12 RBI tied the World Series record set by Bobby Richardson in 1960 -- Richardson needed seven games; Freeman did it in five. Freeman played the entire series on a badly injured right ankle.

Why did the Yankees lose the 2024 World Series?

A few reasons converged. Gerrit Cole was brilliant (0.71 ERA, 12.2 IP) and got no decisions. The Dodgers tagged Rodón for four earned runs in 3.1 innings in Game 2 and Schmidt couldn't hold the game in Game 3. The decisive blow came in Game 5: the Yankees led 5-0 in the fifth inning when three defensive miscues -- errors by Judge and Volpe, plus Cole failing to cover first on a Betts grounder -- produced five unearned runs without a single earned hit. The Yankees couldn't rebuild the lead in the eighth. It's the kind of loss that you turn over in your head for years.

How many times have the Yankees played the Dodgers in the World Series?

The 2024 meeting was the 12th time these franchises have met in the Fall Classic -- more than any other two teams in baseball history. The Yankees entered with an 8-3 all-time advantage (wins in 1941, 1947, 1949, 1952, 1953, 1956, 1977, and 1978; losses in 1955, 1963, and 1981). The Dodgers' 2024 win narrowed it to Yankees 8, Dodgers 4. The 2024 series was also the first time they'd faced each other since 1981 -- a 43-year gap.

What were Aaron Judge's stats in the 2024 World Series?

Judge hit .222 (4-for-18) with one home run and three RBI in five games -- a difficult series for the AL MVP in his first career Fall Classic. He homered in Game 5's first inning back-to-back with Jazz Chisholm Jr., and the Yankees took a 5-0 lead. Then, later in that same game, he dropped a fly ball in center field in the fifth inning -- one of three defensive miscues that allowed five unearned runs to score. It was the kind of series that follows a player around in the way that great October performances never quite let go.