The Los Angeles Dodgers are back in the World Series for a second consecutive year after defeating the Milwaukee Brewers at Miller Park in a win-or-go home Game 7 of the National League Championship Series.
For the Dodgers to reach this point required a team-wide effort. The club deployed 15 different players in the elimination contest, including five pitchers that limited the Brewers to only one run and seven hits.
On the offensive side, Los Angeles was propelled by two swings from Cody Bellinger and Yasiel Puig. The former put the Dodgers on the scoreboard with a two-run home run in the second — just one-half inning removed from Christian Yelich giving the Brewers an early 1-0 lead.
Puig later iced the Dodgers’ victory with a three-run blast in the sixth off Milwaukee right-hander Jeremy Jeffress, providing enough cushion for Kenley Jansen and Clayton Kershaw to record the final seven outs of the game.
Ahead of their meeting with the Boston Red Sox, Bellinger declared that it will be difficult knocking off the talented Dodgers in the World Series, per Joe Trezza of MLB.com:
“We have a talented team. It’s going to be hard to beat us,” Bellinger said. “We told everyone not to worry. We understood the talent that we had. Now we’re here.”
As Bellinger notes, the Dodgers’ well-constructed roster proved deep enough to overcome an eight-game deficit in the NL West earlier this year. He previously revealed that the clubhouse never panicked in the wake of their slow start over the first two months of the regular season.
For Bellinger himself, he went on to earn NLCS MVP honors despite hitting only .200/.231/.360 in seven games against the Brewers. Prior to his go-ahead home run on Saturday, he delivered a walk-off single in the 13th inning in Game 4 to even up the matchup at the time.
