From backs to the wall to back-to-back? The dynasty Yankees give their advice to the Dodgers
-
Buster Olney
When Joe Torre was the manager of the last major league team to win back-to-back championships and the New York Yankees faced moments like the Los Angeles Dodgers face now, at the precipice of elimination, he would remind the players how great they were.
“It was always one of the biggest parts of Joe Torre’s speeches,” recalled Paul O’Neill, the right fielder for the Yankees at that time. “He’d say, ‘The talent in this room is good enough to win this.’ When he said it, you believed it.”
The accomplishments of those Yankees teams are presented neatly in the record book, like perfectly boxed museum relics: Those Yankees won the World Series in 1998, 1999 and 2000 — three consecutive seasons, the heart of a dynasty bookended by the 1996 championship and a Game 7 loss in the 2001 World Series. Four championships in the span of five years; five World Series appearances in six years.
But in building that legacy, the Yankees were repeatedly pushed to the brink, and through the long regular seasons and the short intense rounds of playoffs, they intermittently looked older or tired or vulnerable — as the Dodgers have to some rival evaluators over the past 72 hours.
In conversation last week, Torre recounted how the Yankees won 114 games in the regular season in 1998, and suddenly played very tight in the American League Championship Series. As they dropped two of the first three games to Cleveland in the best-of-seven series, he sensed they were more focused on validating their summerlong accomplishment than on the postseason business at hand. Torre called a meeting and remembers saying, “Guys, you got to have some fun. You’re trying to prove the 114 wins are not a fluke.'” After the meeting was over, O’Neill found Torre and said, “Skip, it’s not fun unless you win.”
In 1999, Torre left the team to be treated for cancer and the Yankees played listlessly in his absence, drifting into second place before rebounding. At the end of the 2000 regular season, the Yankees lost 15 of their last 18 games and each of their last five games, clinching only because the Boston Red Sox had lost a game — and Torre had to remind them to celebrate, to recognize an accomplishment built over the long season. In the division series against Oakland, the Yankees lost Game 4 in Yankee Stadium and flew across the country overnight to play a winner-take-all Game 5. They won, barely surviving an A’s team that seemed younger, faster, better. In the end, there was another championship parade, another foundational piece in a legacy.
Whether the Dodgers can respond similarly and become the first team in a quarter century to win back-to-back titles will be decided in the next two days. Like those Yankees teams, they are loaded with stars, some future Hall of Famers, and so much postseason experience that its impact is tangible. O’Neill explained that through the dynasty, Yankees players learned to trust each other and believe that in tough moments, they would respond, individually, collectively. “You just come to believe everybody will do their part,” said Darryl Strawberry, part of the Yankees’ championships in 1996, 1998 and 1999.
David Cone was a leader on those teams and believes that the pitching was a separator for the Yankees, a backbone of the success. “Overall pitching, and Mariano [Rivera] at the back end of games,” he wrote in a text. “We really had four No. 1 starters, similar to the Dodgers’ rotation.”
Roger Clemens, part of that rotation in 1999 and 2000, noted the inherent good fortune required to repeat as champions, avoiding the injuries that can take down a team. “Throughout the season, you use 50-plus players just to get through the marathon of the year,” he texted. “Once you have the pieces like the Dodgers have, it’s about executing and taking advantage of opportunities that arise in each game.”
Strawberry said, “You’ve just got to keep your focus. That’s not always easy.
“Joe always reminded us how good we were, and to keep a foot on the gas.”
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts has a long-standing friendship with Torre, who reaches out to him from time to time, checking on him, encouraging him. Under the circumstances, it’s possible that Roberts’ words to his team before Yoshinobu Yamamoto takes the mound for Game 6 of the World Series will echo a lot of what Torre said in his years as the Yankees manager.
In Torre’s first year as Yankees manager, he told the players, “I don’t want to win one World Series. I want to win three in a row.”
Torre recalled, “I said that just to let them know, ‘Once you win, that’s fine. But you have more work to do. I don’t care what line of work you’re in: Once you stop to admire what you’ve accomplished, you stop doing it.”
The 2025 Dodgers may have reached that crossroads, and as Torre did, Roberts could remind the Dodgers how extraordinary they’ve been and how they have more to do. Heritage construction can be — and must be, at times — a messy business.
We’re going to Game 7!
In a must-win Game 6 of the 2025 World Series, the Los Angeles Dodgers delivered. After manager Dave Roberts shook up his lineup, new cleanup hitter Mookie Betts broke out of a series-long slump and starting pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto was excellent again on the mound. Then, in the bottom of the ninth inning, Enrique Hernandez and the Dodgers’ defense turned an incredible double play to end a rally and force the Toronto Blue Jays to a winner-take-all finale on Saturday night.
Here’s how L.A.’s victory went down, with our in-game analysis and postgame takeaways.
Takeaways
Series tied at 3
It was over when …: Enrique Hernandez caught an Andres Gimenez line drive and threw it to Miguel Rojas for an improbable game-ending double play. The Blue Jays had put men on second and third with no one out in the bottom of the ninth off closer Roki Sasaki (an Addison Barger double getting stuck in the outfield fence prevented runs from scoring), and the Dodgers were forced to turn to Tyler Glasnow — who got out of the jam, thanks in part to his defense, to force Game 7 on Saturday night.
Star of Game 6: Toronto made Yoshinobu Yamamoto work a little harder this time, but he still worked six outstanding frames, limiting the Blue Jays to one run and working around traffic several times. Yamamoto is now 4-1 with a 1.56 ERA over five October outings. If that’s it for his postseason run, he’s done his part for the Dodgers and more. This is why L.A. signed him to the biggest contract ever given to a pitcher when he inked it.
The stat that defined the game: In the last 30 years, there have been five players to pitch 15-plus innings in the World Series and allow two runs or fewer: Randy Johnson in 2001, Josh Beckett in 2003, Jon Lester in 2013, Madison Bumgarner in 2014 — and Yoshinobu Yamamoto in 2025, according to ESPN Research. Each of the previous four saw their team win the World Series.
What it means for the series: Blue Jays manager John Schneider knew he had a game to work with. There was no reason to go all hands on deck, and since the game was well-pitched by both teams, neither bullpen was annihilated by the events of Game 6. This was a risk the Dodgers would have had to take to survive, but thanks to Yamamoto and the clean work from the relievers that followed him, the Dodgers join the Blue Jays in having a staff in good shape for Saturday. Game 7 will be a fascinating chess match from the time the starting pitchers and lineups are announced. If the finale is anything like the different scenes of what has come before it, it’s going to be special. — Bradford Doolittle
Relive all the action
-
Adam Rittenberg
SMU and coach Rhett Lashlee are finalizing a new seven-year contract through the 2032 season, sources confirmed to ESPN.
The agreement, which will extend Lashlee’s current deal by two seasons, is expected to place him among the 10 highest-paid coaches in college football, according to sources.
The deal will likely ensure Lashlee returns to SMU in 2026. He had been mentioned as a potential candidate for the coach opening at Arkansas, his alma mater, as well as other vacancies in the South and Southeast. In November 2024, he agreed to an extension with SMU through 2030.
Lashlee guided SMU to the College Football Playoff last season in the team’s first year as an ACC member. He’s 34-15 at the school with an American Conference title in 2023 and an ACC runner-up finish last season.
Lashlee, 42, had been an offensive coordinator at Miami, SMU, UConn, Auburn and Samford, before replacing Sonny Dykes as the Mustangs’ head coach. SMU made significant financial commitments to enter the ACC and remain a CFP contender.
SMU, in its homecoming game, will host the No. 10 Miami Hurricanes on Saturday.
Yahoo first reported the expected agreement between SMU and Lashlee.
-
Sports2 years agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports3 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Sports3 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment1 year agoHere are the best electric bikes you can buy at every price level in October 2024