The Los Angeles Dodgers reached the World Series for a second straight year in 2018, but it brought more heartache as they again fell short of ending the franchise’s championship drought.
The team was just a handful of outs away from tying the series at two against the Boston Red Sox in Game 4, leading 4-0 in the seventh inning at Dodger Stadium.
It all went downhill from there though as the bullpen was not able to preserve the lead, and the Red Sox earned a come-from-behind victory to take a commanding 3-1 series lead, and then closed it out 24 hours later in Game 5.
While losing in the World Series for the second straight year is obviously tough, Justin Turner was able to take some positives away from last season, via Andy McCullough of the L.A. Times:
“That’s the hard part — staying positive about how good of a year we had the last two years,” Turner said. “Because the perception is ‘We lost the World Series twice, so it was a [bad] year.’ But at the same time, we lost the World Series. So it wasn’t a failure.”
Now that he has reported to Spring Training for 2019, Turner described his motivation to get back to and finally win the World Series as ‘psychotic,’ which seems to be a bit of a theme throughout the Dodgers clubhouse.
The Dodgers are once again widely viewed as the favorites to not only win the National League West but to return to the World Series in 2019 after returning their core nucleus of players.
Their offseason acquisitions include outfielder A.J. Pollock, catcher Russell Martin and reliever Joe Kelly, who all address certain needs for the team that they lacked in 2018, particularly in the postseason.
