LOS ANGELES -- All season, the Los Angeles Dodgers have danced along the edge of a great precipice. After blowing a lead the Dodgers never blow, the Boston Red Sox are one game from shoving Los Angeles into the void.
Pinch hitter Rafael Devers stroked an RBI single in the ninth to plate Brock Holt, and Steve Pearce broke the game open with a bases-clearing triple, lifting Boston to a 9-6 win on Saturday in Game 4 of the World Series. The Red Sox now own a commanding 3-1 lead in the 114th Fall Classic.
Pearce homered in the eighth off Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen to tie the game at 4-4 and erase what had been a four-run lead for Los Angeles. With the shocking turn of events, rather than a dead-even series, one more win will give the Red Sox their fourth title since 2004 and will extend the Dodgers' title drought to 30 years.
The Dodgers were unable to mount a big enough rally against Boston closer Craig Kimbrel, leaving L.A. with their backs against the wall -- a spot they've managed to find themselves in time and again all season despite winning a second straight National League pennant.
It was a night of themes that have recurred throughout the series.
For the second straight night, a late Red Sox homer off Dodgers relief ace Kenley Jansen set up the late-game drama. On Saturday, it was Steve Pearce who touched up Jansen, hammering a first-pitch cutter to left to knot the score at 4-4. In Friday's Game 3, it was Jackie Bradley Jr.'s blast off Jansen that erased a late one-run Dodger lead.
The Dodgers' first run Saturday came courtesy of a Boston error, just as L.A. tied Friday's 18-inning marathon in the 13th on an error. This time, with the bases loaded and one out in the sixth, Cody Bellinger hit a hard grounder right at Pearce at first, setting up a force out at home. However, Red Sox catcher Christian Vazquez threw the ball away while trying to complete the double play at first, allowing Justin Turner to race home with the game's first run.
The error proved even more costly than when Yasiel Puig's thunderbolt flew 439 feet into the Los Angeles night, a three-run home run that put the Dodgers up by what has been an insurmountable lead for them all season. Entering the game, the Dodgers were 54-0 when owning a four-run lead at any point of a ballgame.
It seemed like plenty of run support for starter Rich Hill, who dazzled the Red Sox with his assortment of well-placed fastballs and physics-defying curves. Hill allowed just one hit over 6⅓ innings with seven strikeouts and three walks. His outing -- getting back to recurrent themes -- was reminiscent of the seven-inning gem put up by Dodgers rookie Walker Buehler in Game 3.
Then, a couple of themes the Dodgers preferred not to recur cropped up again. After lefty Scott Alexander issued a four-pitch walk, righty reliever Ryan Madson came on for what turned out to be a continuation of his nightmarish World Series. Madson got Bradley to pop out, but then his first-pitch changeup to pinch hitter Mitch Moreland disappeared into the right-field bleachers for a stunning, three-run homer.
Moreland's blast traveled 437 feet, only two shy of Puig's big blow, and pulled the Red Sox within one. Madson has now allowed all seven of the runners he has inherited during the World Series to score, the most any reliever has allowed in a single Fall Classic. Ironically, when Moreland touched home, it was the first run Madson was charged with during the series. All the others went on someone else's ledger.
That set the stage for Pearce in the eighth. Home runs have been the bugaboo for the formerly infallible Jansen, who was being asked to get six outs for the second straight night. However, once Boston tied the game on a Pearce solo shot, Jansen was replaced by Dylan Floro for the start of the ninth. Jansen allowed a career-high 13 home runs during the regular season, more than double his previous high, and now he has allowed two during the postseason.
With the work of the starting pitchers undone, it set up another bullpen game -- which in theory should have favored the Dodgers, whose relief corps fared better in terms of workload during Friday's 7-hour, 20-minute game that was the longest in postseason history.
Before the game, the Dodgers stirred some happy memories for their fans by bringing out Kirk Gibson to throw the ceremonial first pitch. Then, before he could throw it, they announced that Dennis Eckersley would actually make the pitch, with Gibson catching.
Eckersley, who donned an Oakland Athletics uniform, served up Gibson's Game 1-winning homer in 1988 that spurred the Dodgers to their last World Series title. Eckersley now works as an analyst on Red Sox broadcasts.
With one more loss, the Dodgers will have to keep pointing at that long-ago Fall Classic as a reminder of ultimate postseason joy.
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