As we all know, the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the New York Yankees in the World Series, taking them in five games, with the final game in New York at Yankee Stadium. It was the World Series that everyone wanted to see, but those who saw it still couldn’t believe their eyes for several reasons.

Here are some elements of the Dodgers’ 2024 season and the World Series win that are significant…perhaps overlooked…but will be remembered.

The Dream Series, Dodgers and Yankees.

Everyone wanted this World Series. When the playoffs started, no one team was seen as a shoo-in or even an outright favorite to make it to the World Series. The Yankee faithful hoped their team would end their 15-year drought of not making it to the World Series, the longest stretch ever. The Yankees had the best record in the American League and the third best overall. Everyone thought and hoped this could be their year. The Dodgers, despite having the best record in baseball, were not expected to go far in the playoffs. Somehow, they made it past the Padres and the latest version of the Amazin’ Mets to face the Yankees for the 12th time in history, seven as the Brooklyn Dodgers.

Since moving to Los Angeles, the Dodgers have faced the Yankees five times in the World Series and have won three, including the last two. “Dem Bums” were left back in Brooklyn.

The 1988 and 2024 World Series had some eerie parallels for L.A.

There were more than a few interesting similarities between the 1988 World Champion Dodgers and the ’24 champs:

• Canseco/McGwire: Meet Judge/Stanton. In ’88, the Dodgers needed to hold off the Bash Brothers duo of José Canseco and Mark McGwire, who combined for 76 home runs, 42 and 32, respectively. This year, it was the Yankees’ Aaron Judge (54 homers) and Giancarlo Stanton (27), 81 total, who’d be swinging for the fences. But in both cases, those players didn’t come through as hoped. They combined for three home runs in five games total.
• Buehler channels Hershiser. In 1988, starting pitcher Orel Hershiser came in to pitch the ninth inning of Game 4 of the NLCS against the Mets, even though he had thrown seven innings the day before…and L.A. won. Hershiser also started Games 1, 3 and 7. In ’24, Walker Buehler, who’d missed most of the regular season, came on in relief (the first time ever) with one day’s rest to shut down the Yankees in the 9th inning of Game 5 to win the World Series. Buehler had also pitched Game 3 of the Series, throwing five scoreless innings on his way to a 4-2 victory.
• Freeman imitates Gibson. In 1988, in World Series Game 1 at Dodger Stadium, an injured Kirk Gibson limped up to the plate in the bottom of the ninth inning with two outs to hit a walk-off home run into the left-field bleachers against Dennis Eckersley to defeat the A’s 5-4. In ’24, Freddie Freeman, who had a severe ankle injury during the playoffs and (as we learned later) injured ribs, walked up to the plate with two outs in the ninth inning in Game 1 at Dodger Stadium and hit a walk-off grand slam into the very same left-field bleachers. Both home runs were hit at around 8:38 p.m. Pacific Time.

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“Mr. October” is taken, so what can we call Freddie Freeman?

There has to be a fitting nickname for Freddie Freeman after his home run heroics in the ’24 Fall Classic, part of a record-making World Series achievement that will be hard to match. Not only did Freddie Freeman hit a walk-off grand slam, which had never been done in World Series history (and with injured ribs and a bum ankle), but he would go on to hit a home run in Games 2, 3 and 4, the first to ever hit a home run in consecutive games in a single World Series. It gets better: Freeman had homered in the last two games of the 2021 World Series when his Atlanta Braves beat the Houston Astros. That means Freeman had homered in six consecutive World Series games, and his team won five of those. So far, no one has found a suitable nickname for Freddie.

Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge were a big part of the story…just not as we expected.

This World Series was billed as the showdown between Aaron Judge, the Bronx Bomber who hit 58 home runs this season, and Shohei Ohtani, who became the first player to steal at least 50 bases (he stole 59) and hit 50 home runs (he hit 54). The game in which Ohtani hit three home runs and stole two bases to reach 50/50 is considered one of the best single-game performances ever. But in the 2024 World Series, neither Ohtani nor Judge (the likely NL and AL MVPs) delivered the type of performance everyone expected.

• Ohtani injured his shoulder badly in the second game while sliding into second base. He stayed in the lineup for the final games but couldn’t produce any hits. He hit .105 for the Series.
• Judge’s performances, sadly, will be remembered for all the wrong reasons. He went four for 18 (.222), with just one home run, three RBI and seven strikeouts. Worst of all, he dropped a routine fly ball in center that opened the floodgates to a horrendous fifth inning of the final Series game, which erased the Yankees’ 5-0 lead.

The ghost of Fernando Valenzuela.

Fernando Valenzuela was a phenom in 1981, becoming the first pitcher to win Rookie of the Year and the Cy Young Award in the same season. He started that ’81 campaign with eight straight victories, setting the baseball world on fire. In the playoffs that season, he had a record of 3-1, including a complete-game victory in Game 3 in the World Series against the Yankees. That was the last time the two teams had faced each other in the Fall Classic. During the 2024 Series, the Dodgers wore a number 34 patch on their uniforms to honor Fernando and had a moment of silence for him before Game 1.

The Dodgers World Series victory parade in Los Angeles to celebrate the 2024 championship was held on November 1, 2024, on what would have been Fernando Valenzuela’s 64th birthday.