LOS ANGELES — What sort of euphoria gripped the Dodgers’ clubhouse, after they survived the longest game in World Series history?
This sort: Manny Machado added to his remarkable October price deflation … only this time he owned up to his mistake.
Max Muncy’s walk-off, 18th-inning homer off Nathan Eovaldi gave the Dodgers a 3-2 victory early Saturday morning in Game 3 at Dodger Stadium. It took seven hours and 20 minutes, but the Dodgers cut the Red Sox’s lead to 2-1 and gave this matchup an air of legitimacy. It also rendered irrelevant Machado’s sixth-inning double-turned-single as well as his overall 1-for-7 showing.
Well, irrelevant to all besides those watching this series through the prism of the future. As in, “Should my team spend big on Machado?”
Machado has given the Yankees and other potential suitors multiple reasons to think twice about a huge commitment to him. He often has compounded his mistakes by saying the wrong thing afterward.
So that he at least said the right thing among a group of jubilant teammates constitutes some sort of progress. If it won’t soothe any concerns, it at least won’t inflame them further.
With two outs in the sixth inning and the Dodgers holding a 1-0 lead, Machado connected on a Joe Kelly knuckle-curveball and sent it over the head of Red Sox left fielder J.D. Martinez.
“At first I thought it wasn’t going,” Machado said. “Then I saw it take off up, and I kind of thought it was going to go out.”
Hence he didn’t run. So when the ball hit the middle of the wall in left-center field. Machado had to settle for the single. Cody Bellinger popped out to Brock Holt at second base to end the inning.
Daren Willman, Major League Baseball’s director of research and development, tweeted that it took Machado 7.17 seconds to travel from home plate to first base. As matter of comparison, Yahoo’s Jeff Passan noted that in National League Championship Series Game 7, Machado ran out a bunt single in 3.96 seconds.
“That was very, very, very, very poor baserunning by me,” Machado said. “I probably wasn’t going to be on second base, but very embarrassing.”
He didn’t make up for it during the game. He lost an eight-pitch, eighth-inning battle with Red Sox reliever Matt Barnes, striking out to end the frame with Muncy stranded at first base. In the 10th, he stranded Muncy at second when he popped out to Red Sox shortstop Xander Bogaerts. In the 13th, after the Red Sox jumped ahead, he followed Muncy’s walk with a pop out to left field; the Dodgers scored the tying run after that. And in the 15th, he popped out to second base.
Hence Machado’s chaotic postseason continued. He found all sorts of trouble against the Brewers in the National League Championship Series, getting accused by Milwaukee’s Christian Yelich of being a “dirty player” after he kicked Brewers first baseman Jesus Aguilar and declaring to The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal, “I’m not the type of player that’s going to be ‘Johnny Hustle,’ and run down the line and slide to first base.”
He honored those words again, only to relent a little bit. Think of how many Yankees fans loathed Robinson Cano because of his hustle optics — and Cano actually worked hard in different ways, showing up at the ballpark early and helping young Latino teammates transition into the big leagues.
If you’re Machado’s representatives, you’re losing hairs each time Manny pulls a Manny. Yet you’re glad he repented on such an otherwise glorious night for his team.
“Nobody said it was going to be easy. It hasn’t been easy for us all year,” said Machado, who joined the Dodgers in July. “Just tells you how much heart we have, how much grind we have in here.”
A little more grind from Machado moving forward would go a long way for his case.
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