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LOS ANGELES – The clock spun past midnight, the moon, the pitchers kept pitching, the hitters kept trying to hit, the crowd thinned out and finally the longest in 7 hours, 20 minutes.
Max Muncy was the hero, leading to a 3-2 pitch from Nathan Eovaldi over the fence to a few inches to spare. It gave the Dodgers a 3-2 victory over the Red Sox and maybe saved their season: No team has ever come back from a 3-0 deficit to win the World Series.
"I do not really know what to say," Dodgers outfielder Cody Bellinger said. "I'm just glad Muncy hit the home run so we can go home and get some sleep."
Muncy, the surprise slugger all season long rider depths in the Dodgers with 35 home runs, almost won the game with a home run in the 15th feet to the right of the foul pole in right field. He did not miss his next time up against Eovaldi.
"We've been fighting for our lives since April, and we got it tonight," Muncy said. "Really long game, talk about a good pitcher over there [in Eovaldi]. He was doing just about anything he wanted with the ball and it was throwing 101 mph. Hats off to him for that game he pitched. But for you to be able to get this, you got to feel like you're going into tomorrow. "
Maybe the best way to go to the Dodger Stadium: Of the 50 players on both rosters, Chris Sale and Drew Pomeranz for the Red Sox and Rich Hill and Hyun-Jin Ryu the Dodgers. The 46 players used on both teams was a record for any postseason game. The Red Sox burned through a record-tying nine-pitchers, including Eovaldi, the projected Game 4 starter who pitched the final six-plus innings – leaving the Red Sox without a starter for Game 4 until Alex Cora announces one Saturday afternoon.
The Red Sox are still up in the series 2-1, but the Dodgers knew they needed this one.
"This was a must win for us, 100 percent, that's why we were grinding the last out, until the last run came across the board," third baseman Dodgers Manny Machado said.
The game featured a wild 13th inning when both teams scored on errors. The Red Sox, Brock Holt, Brock Holt. Eduardo Nunez dribbled a ball between the pitcher 's mound and first base, but second baseman Enrique Hernandez could not handle the flip of Scott Alexander' s pitcher as he was heading to the base line.
The last time a go-ahead run scored in a new World Series game was the infamous error of training Red Sox first baseman Bill Buckner in Game 6 in 1986 against the New York Mets.
The Dodgers tied it up, however, with two outs in the bottom of the inning. Muncy walked leading off and taking a second look at it while Nunez tumbled into the Bellinger's catching booths pop-up foul. Yasiel Puig hit a hard grounder with two outs to second baseman Ian Kinsler. His foot gave way to the fringe of the outfield as he went to his home base, allowing him to trot home with the tying run. That was the latest in a team had ever tied to the World Series game.
"I had the last one in my glove and could not get it over there," Kinsler said. "Tough to swallow."
The Red Sox was not blaming Kinsler for the loss. "We did everything we could to win that game," said Nunez, who spent the game falling and diving all over the place. He even tripped on the pitcher 's mound catching an infield pop – up. "We lose together, we win together," he added. "Everybody can make a mistake in any situation, we're fine, it just happened."
The Red Sox have other reasons to kick themselves. They could not touch Dodgers Walker rookie Buehler, who fired seven scoreless innings. Jackie Bradley Jr. Kenley Jansen, but the Red Sox could not do anything against the parade off Dodgers relievers. It was not a help that J.D. Martinez was pinch-run for the top of the 10th and a double-switch left light-hitting catcher Christian Vazquez playing first base for the first time in his major league career. The top four spots in the Red Sox lineup went to combined 0-for-28, including 0-for-15 from Mookie Betts and Xander Bogaerts.
"It was a great baseball game," Cora said. "Seven hours, no matter where you are, where you're going to be." But it's probably one of the best, if not the best, I've never been a part of.
The 18 innings shattered the previous World Series record of 14 innings, done three times previously: 2015 Game 1 (Mets-Royals), 2005 Game 3 (White Sox-Astros) and 1916 Game 2 (Brooklyn Robins-Red Sox). The most popular strikeouts in the World Series game with 34.
And, yes, the long game created other problems for players.
"I had to [pee] Since the seventh inning, "Bellinger said." We had drug testers in there so we could not [pee] yet because we did not know who was getting drug tested. I'm glad [Muncy] hit the home run so I can finally see if I get tested or not. "
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