The long awaited spring sport of Major League Baseball has finally arrived. The first couple of games came during the Seoul Series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres.
The first game of the series was on March 20th and the second game of the series on the next day. This series had many MLB fans around the world excited as there has been no MLB in over 4 months. Excitement also came about since multiple transactions made by the Dodgers in the offseason, which cost them over $1 billion. Some of these trades and signings included Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow, and many more players. Fans were excited to see how this new and improved team would perform.
The first game started off slow, with no scoring until the bottom of the third inning by the Padres on a Xander Boegarts RBI single. The Dodgers would come back at the top of the fourth, scoring a run with a Jason Heyward sacrificing fly to bring in the tying run.
The Padres would then come back in their half of the inning scoring on a fielder’s choice, giving them the lead 2-1. There would be no more runs after this until the top of the 8th inning, when the Dodgers had a 4-run rally including an Enrique Hernandez sacrifice fly, Gavin Lux grounding into a fielder’s choice, a Mookie Betts RBI single, as well as a Shohei Ohtani RBI single. These offensive plays by the Dodgers would give them a 5-2 lead and ultimately a 5-2 win over the Padres in the first game of the series.
Many were waiting excitedly for the second game since it would be the first start by Yoshinobu Yamamoto in the MLB. It did not go too well for Yamamoto though, as he let 5 runs score in the first by a 2-run Jake Cronenworth triple, a Ha-Seong Kim sacrifice fly, a Luis Campusano RBI double and a Tyler Wade RBI single. Yamamoto only lasted 1 inning in his MLB Debut.
The Dodgers would have a long way to come back after the first inning, but they were not out of it yet. Will Smith hit an RBI double in the bottom of the first inning to cut the lead to 4. Shohei Ohtani would then hit a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the second inning to cut the lead to 3 runs, the score was 5-2 Padres at this point. The Padres would get straight back to scoring in the top of the third inning, scoring 2 runs on a Xander Boegarts single, 1 run on a Fernando Tatis Jr. single, and 1 run on a Jake Cronenworth sacrifice fly, the score was 9-2 Padres after this.
The Dodgers would then score 4 runs of their own with a James Outman fielder’s choice, Jason Heyward RBI single, and a 2-run RBI double by Mookie Betts. The score was 9-6 Padres after the 3rd inning. No scoring would happen in the 4th inning, but in the top of the 5th inning, Jake Cronenworth extended the Padres lead to 10-6 after an RBI single.
The Dodgers would cancel out that run the Padres scored with a 2-run Mookie Betts homerun. This was the first homerun of the MLB season and cut down the Padres lead to 2, 10-8. Right after that, in the top of the sixth inning, Luis Campusano brought in a run with an RBI double. Then in the top of the 7th inning, Xander Boegarts would score due to a Dodgers fielding error, making the score 12-8.
The Dodgers would need a bit of a comeback now if they wanted a chance to win this game. In the bottom of the 7th inning, Will Smith drove in a run with an RBI single. In the bottom of the 8th inning, Mookie Betts would cut the lead down to 1 with a 2-run single. The score was 12-11 Padres after this.
The Dodgers would have to hold the Padres to no runs and then score a run in the bottom of the 9th to have a chance at winning. They were unsuccessful in doing this, as in the top of the 9th inning, Manny Machado hit a 3-run homerun to extend the Padres lead to 4. 15-11. The Dodgers would not score after this and the Padres would win, splitting the series.
This Seoul Series was truly a spectacular start to this 2024 MLB Season and many fans, including myself, are excited to watch the rest of this MLB Season. These first few games were so fun to watch and were exciting, and it's only the beginning!
Image courtesy of Flickr: Chris Kim