The Dodgers came “…a huge huge play…” away from leaving the City of Brotherly Love with the 2025 National League Division Series tied at one game apiece with the Philadelphia Phillies at Citizens Bank Park on Monday evening.
With the Dodgers up 4-1 heading into the bottom of the ninth, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts called upon struggling 37-year-old right-hander Blake Treinen to bring an end to what should have been a relatively easy end to the 3:07-long contest and bring the best-of-five series back home to LA with the Dodgers up two games to none. But as Dodgers fans painfully know, “Blake Treinen” and “relatively easy” do not belong in the same sentence together this season.
The Wichita, KS native and seventh-round draft pick in 2011 by the Oakland Athletics out of South Dakota State University entered Game-2 of the NLDS having finished the 2025 regular season with an ugly 2-7 record and an even uglier 5.40 ERA, causing many (most) Dodgers fans to question why he was even on the Dodgers postseason roster.
On Treinen’s third pitch to Phillies third baseman Alec Bohm, a 97.3 mph sinker, Bohm roped it into center field for a leadoff single.
This was followed by a sharp double to left by Phillies catcher J.T. Realmuto, putting runners at second and third with no outs.
No problem, right?
Wrong.
Realmuto’s double was followed by a double to left by Phillies right fielder Nick Castellanos, on which both Bohm and Realmuto scored to make it a 4-3 ballgame, still with no outs and with Phillies pinch-hitter Bryson Stott coming to the plate representing the winning run. This is when Roberts finally replace Treinen with 29-year-old Dodgers left-hander Alex Vesia.
On Vesia’s second pitch to Stott, he dropped down a bunt that was fielded by hard charging Dodgers third baseman Max Muncy, who turned and fired a dart to Dodgers shortstop Mookie Betts, who tagged out a sliding Castellanos at third base for the (huge) first out of the inning. That said, Stott was now standing on first base representing the tying run. That play, which teams practice extensively during Spring Training, is appropriately called a wheel play.
This is when things got real interesting,
Phillies pinch-hitter Harrison Bader laced a single to left to put runners on first and second and only one out. Fortunately, Vesia got Phillies left fielder Max Kepler to ground into a force out to Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman who fired to Betts at second base for the second out of the inning. It did, however, move Stott (representing the tying run) to third base, with Kepler standing on first base (representing the winning run).
Phillies manager Rob Thomson replaced Bader with speedy pinch-runner Weston Wilson, and Roberts replaced Vesia with 23-year-old right-hander Roki Sasaki, who every Dodger fan on the planet thought should have started the bottom of the ninth instead of Treinen. As Dodgers fans recall, it was Sasaki who picked up the save in Game-1 of the series on Saturday, doing so like a veteran closer.
On Sasaki’s second pitch to Phillies shortstop Trea Turner, the former Dodger hit a hard grounder to second baseman Tommy Edman, who bounced his throw to Freeman, which the nine-time All-Star, former NL MVP, three-time Silver Slugger, and Gold Glove winning future first-ballot Hall of Famer scooped out of the dirt to secure the Dodgers intense 4-3 win.
(TBS)
“Obviously, Tommy threw one into the dirt and thankfully I was able to catch it and stay on the base,” the modest 37-year-old Villa Park, CA native told reporters.
“To get that kind of in-between hop from Tommy, that was a huge huge play,” Roberts said of Freeman’s game-saving play.
All four Dodgers runs came in the top of the seventh inning, the first of a fielders choice to short by Dodgers left fielder Kiké Hernández on which his namesake Teoscar scored on a very close play at the plate; so close, in fact, that the Phillies challenged the safe call – and lost.
(TBS)
The next two Dodgers runs came on a clutch bases loaded pinch-hit single to left by Dodgers catcher Will Smith to make it 3-0.
The Dodgers fourth and what proved to be the game-winning run came on an equally clutch single to right by international superstar Shohei Ohtani with two outs in the inning.
(TBS)
Welcome home, boys!
Play Ball!
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