LOS ANGELES — The marching band played on the concourse, the radio talk show went live from the warning track in front of the home dugout and the drone for the television broadcast took flight.
And yet the October-style intensity did not get going until a pair of MVPs hit first-inning home runs. The spectacle didn’t stop there.
There was plenty to savor in the opener of a weekend World Series rematch, with Shohei Ohtani and the Dodgers getting the best of Aaron Judge and the New York Yankees in an 8-5 victory.
It opened as the heavyweight fight it was billed to be when Judge hit a home run off of Tony Gonsolin as the second batter of the game. Ohtani matched that in the bottom of the first when he connected on Max Fried’s first pitch of the game.
By the time it ended, the memories of the clinching Game 5 of last year’s World Series were so rich it played out like a reenactment, only with Dodgers fans on hand to savor what went down in the Bronx last fall.
The Dodgers scored five runs in the fifth inning of the Game 5 clincher in the World Series, and they delivered four in the sixth on Friday to rally from multiple three-run deficits.
No pair of reigning MVPs had ever hit home runs in the first inning of the same game. The last time it happened in any inning of the same game was in 2003 when the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland Athletics’ Miguel Tejada did it.
“When you see a bunch of superstars on the field, that’s exciting,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said before the game, while also trying to play down the importance of a May series. “I love watching great players, but it is still another ball game that still counts the same. But, yeah, when you’re playing a great team, a great franchise, and certainly it should kind of ramp up a little bit.”
Ohtani was the star of all stars when his second home run of the game brought the Dodgers within 5-3 in the sixth. The deficit was cut to 5-4 on an RBI double to left field from World Series MVP Freddie Freeman.
The Dodgers tied it at 5-5 on an RBI single from Andy Pages against Jonathan Loaisiga. After pinch hitter Max Muncy was walked intentionally to load the bases with one out, Michael Conforto put the Dodgers up 6-5 with a walk against left-hander Tim Hill.
Pages’ two-run single in the seventh came against Yerry De los Santos.
The Dodgers also managed to hand Fried (7-1) his first loss of the season. The left-hander and Harvard-Westlake product matched a season high by allowing six runs in five-plus innings. His eight hits allowed were also a season high.
Gonsolin (3-1) was rocked for four home runs in the first three innings but managed to deliver six innings, and the bullpen took it from there with Alex Vesia closing out the ninth inning for his second save.
Judge crushed a 446-foot home run to center in the first, before Ohtani covered it with a 417-foot shot to center.
By the time the third inning was complete, the Yankees had a 5-2 lead on home runs from Austin Wells, Trent Grisham and Paul Goldschmidt.
While the Yankees rolled out three league MVPs in Judge, Goldschmidt and Cody Bellinger, the Dodgers had two in Ohtani and Freeman. It would have been a third but Mookie Betts was a late scratch with a toe injury.
Each roster included an additional MVP, with pitcher Clayton Kershaw watching from the Dodgers’ dugout, while Yankees slugger Giancarlo Stanton is on the injured list.
It was an elite show anyway with 53,276 on hand paying a premium price for a show that still offered plenty of value. As the Dodgers earned a much-needed victory following a 3-3 road trip, they ended the Yankees’ six-game winning streak.
New York had also won nine of its previous 10 games and 11 of 13.
More to come on this story.
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