The Dodgers fail to complete the sweep, so all eyes turn to Jack Flaherty for Game 5

NEW YORK – On Tuesday afternoon at quarter past 4 p.m., Jack Flaherty took on a somewhat delicate task. Flaherty is the man the Los Angeles Dodgers hired to plan a Game 5 that wasn't yet guaranteed, with LA on the verge of winning this World Series and Flaherty's pregame press conference becoming a press conference about a start to do something that still remained hypothetical.

“My job is to prepare for tomorrow,” Flaherty told a room full of reporters. “I need to focus on what I need to do to prepare for tomorrow and cheer on these guys tonight. I have to keep my attitude.”

Flaherty is used to floating. In July, he sat in the Detroit Tigers clubhouse for four hours waiting for a decision on his fate at the trade deadline. He was almost a New York Yankee before concerns about his back derailed a deal. Instead, the Dodgers acquired him and on Wednesday night he will pitch at Yankee Stadium with a chance to secure a championship.

“I’m just worried about getting another one,” Flaherty said. “We know we have to continue to play really good baseball to get there because these guys aren't just going to disappear.

The Yankees didn't. “If necessary” was answered in the affirmative Tuesday night as the Yankees came to life with an 11-4 victory. Anthony Volpe's grand slam in the third inning got Flaherty rolling and gave the Dodgers a 3-1 series lead.

Mookie Betts responded after striking out in the seventh inning as the Dodgers remained quiet against the Yankees' bullpen. (Brad Penner/Imagn Images)

The Dodgers scheduled a bullpen game to score a potential game-winning hit in Game 4. They've used this playbook before, with manager Dave Roberts twice keeping their upper arms from deficits during the National League Championship Series. Screw the optics, the Dodgers won the following game both times, each benefiting from having a full complement of substitutes at their disposal.

To win under Tuesday's plan would require multiple innings each from Ben Casparius and Landon Knack, two rookies who were projected earlier in the year to factor more into the Dodgers' 2025 Cactus League plans than a potential winner the World Series. Casparius became the second pitcher ever to make his first major league start in a World Series. Knack was invited to his longest deployment in a month. The two men combined to allow two runs over six innings.

“The most important thing was just saving the guys out there,” Knack said, echoing Brent Honeywell's words after the Dodgers' latest attempt to rescue their top players from the wreckage of a game.

It was the events between Casparius and Knack that set Roberts' tone for the evening. He entrusted Daniel Hudson with an early 2-1 lead and the heart of the Yankees' order. The veteran has fluctuated between roles this summer, in part because of his penchant for allowing fly balls and, by extension, home runs. But he posed a challenge against right-handed sluggers Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton without Roberts having to use one of his upper arms early, leaving them unavailable for a possible Game 5. The fight against Juan Soto acted like a tax. Hudson beat him by getting the prolific hitter to wave over a slider.

From then on, Hudson's command rapidly declined in importance. He hit Judge with a first-pitch fastball. Jazz Chisholm Jr. hit a first-pitch fastball for a single. Hudson also hit Stanton, but Stanton swung through the pitch before issuing a walk to load the bases.

“He was kind of everywhere,” catcher Will Smith said. “It’s different than Huddy.”

“I just couldn’t stop the snowball from getting bigger and bigger,” Hudson said.

Hudson barely managed to escape the Dodgers' lead with a popup, but his first slider to Volpe spun tantalizingly over the middle of the field. It didn't move. Volpe laced the ball into the left field seats to make the score 5-2 and give the Yankees their first lead since Game 1.

“Just one of those things that just jumps out of your hand and you have that moment, “Oh no” Feeling in your stomach,” Hudson said.

Hudson would be the only non-bulk reliever the Dodgers would use. Knack, who was not one of the Dodgers' leverage relievers, grew warmer as the inning progressed.

“I'm not going to get anybody in the third inning to put Volpe where he just popped a guy up…it was his inning,” Roberts said.

It wouldn't have mattered. A lineup that has worn down the Mets' bullpen has yet to do the same thing in the Bronx as it did in Queens, despite multiple considerations. The Yankees bullpen has allowed just one run since Freddie Freeman's walk-off grand slam in Game 1. The Dodgers never came within one run of tying the score. So Roberts didn't push the issue.

“We had a lot of chances to win this ballgame tonight,” Smith said.

The dam broke in the eighth when the Yankees scored five times and put the game out of reach.

“We had urgency,” said Freeman, whose two-run home run gave the Dodgers a lead in the first inning and set a World Series record for a home run in six consecutive games (dated in 2021). “We know what is at stake. We had a chance to win the World Series tonight and we're all in a real rush and want to do it as quickly as possible. We’ll do the same thing tomorrow.”

The Dodgers will do so against reigning American League Cy Young winner Gerrit Cole. The Dodgers once heavily courted the Southern California native as a free agent, offering $300 million (reportedly with deferrals) years before they would do the same for Yoshinobu Yamamoto – to whom they guaranteed $1 million more than the $324 million Cole received from the Yankees would get. Cole pitched six innings of one-run ball in Game 1.

“It’s always nice to see someone you faced a few days ago,” Freeman said. “But he’s still one of the best pitchers in the game. It won’t be easy.”

That will put another strain on the Dodgers' approach in Game 4 and will pay dividends the following night. Flaherty will pitch in regulation on Wednesday and has a chance to win a series, much like he did when the Mets bombed him 12 days earlier. He will have the Dodgers' entire arsenal of relievers behind him and have a chance to earn a celebration and prevent the Yankees' attempt at something unprecedented by overcoming a 3-0 deficit in the World Series.

“Hopefully Jack calms them down and we score more runs than them,” Freeman said.

(Top photo: Steph Chambers / Getty Images)