By Mark Langill
Dave Roberts learned long ago to take any historical baseball trend with a grain of salt.
If you excitedly told the Dodgers manager after Monday’s 4–3 victory in Philadelphia that Los Angeles has never lost a five-game postseason series after opening with two road victories, he might not even need to play the 2004 card.
That fall, the former outfielder and his Boston Red Sox teammates became the first and only team in Major League history to erase a 0–3 deficit in a seven-game series, stunning the New York Yankees in the American League Championship Series in a comeback for the ages.
Flash ahead two decades and there’s no need to worry about overconfidence as the Dodgers look to close out the series on Wednesday at Dodger Stadium.
Against the National League East champion Phillies, the Dodgers barely escaped heartbreak at Citizens Bank Park. Although the game’s boxscore credits novice reliever Roki Sasaki with his second consecutive save in the National League Division Series, it was first baseman Freddie Freeman who kept the Dodgers’ unbeaten postseason streak intact.
Freeman scooped a wild throw from second baseman Tommy Edman, who fielded Trea Turner’s grounder with two outs and runners on first and third.
Instead of the ball skipping past Freeman and starting a not so merry-go-round on the bases, Edman’s throw became a footnote.
“Obviously, Tommy threw one into the dirt,” Freeman said. “Thankfully I was able to catch it and stay on the base. … My gray right here might be up to my sideburn now. That was a stressful inning.”
This is the fourth time the Dodgers have taken a 2–0 lead on the road in a best-of-five series. They won the previous three series, beating the 1974 Pirates and 1978 Phillies in four games and sweeping the 2008 Cubs.
Just as Teoscar Hernández’s three-run home run in Game 1 keyed the Dodgers’ 5–3 victory in Game 1 on Saturday, another big hit in 2008 at Chicago’s Wrigley Field set the tone for Los Angeles on the road during an era when the Cubs were still in search of their first World Series title since 1908.
The Dodgers trailed 2–0 in the fifth inning of their playoff opener. With two outs, first baseman James Loney hit the first grand slam in Dodger postseason history off Chicago starter Ryan Dempster.
The Dodgers won the game 7–2 and cruised to the sweep.
The 2025 Dodgers still have unfinished business, both against the Phillies and in two more rounds of the postseason if they are to successfully defend their World Series crown.
For the moment, Freeman could head to the team bus after Monday’s thriller knowing the Dodgers not only held serve, but they could use their sudden home-field advantage for a knockout blow in either Game 3 on Wednesday or a Game 4 on Thursday.
“I think we were just sitting at our locker as I was getting dressed, and Kiké (Hernandez) said, ‘We just took two here,’ Freeman said. “This is a hard place to play. Incredible fan base. It’s loud here.
“For us to come out here, we were, like, get one. Obviously when we won two days ago, that’s when we tried to gung ho and get two out of here. This is a hard place to play. We obviously put ourselves in great position going into Wednesday.
“To get two in this environment is obviously massive. You can’t understate it. This is a really hard place to play in the regular season, let alone here. This is my first time ever playing here in the playoffs. It is loud. Just hats off to all of us to pull out two wins here.”
2025 NLDS: Road warriors take 2–0 lead back to L.A. was originally published in Dodger Insider on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.