LOS ANGELES – As Yankees reliever Jake Cousins ​​walked to the mound for the bottom of the 10th inning, a simple but delicate task lay before him: eliminate the team in order against the bottom third of the Dodgers lineup – leaving Shohei Ohtani and Mookie Betts. and Freddie Freeman stayed to watch – and Game 1 of the World Series would belong to New York.

If any of Will Smith, Gavin Lux or Tommy Edman reached base, the entire complexion of the ball game would change. With Ohtani looming, Cousins ​​was certain he would be pulled if the soon-to-be NL MVP came into play. And who would face Ohtani from New York’s bullpen in that scenario? That was a question manager Aaron Boone certainly didn’t want to answer.

Six days earlier, Cousins ​​was brilliant in ALCS Game 5, striking out four of the five batters he faced in the later stages of a tie game that the Yankees would win to capture the American League pennant. Cousins ​​is one of several reclamation projects for Yankees relievers who have gradually earned Boone’s trust in high-leverage spots, and with go-to guys Clay Holmes, Tommy Kahnle and Luke Weaver having already pitched in regulation , it was Cousins ​​– with just one career save to his name – who got the ball with the chance to close Game 1.

With three outs remaining, the Yankees would claim a narrow victory in a game that saw ace Gerrit Cole deliver six stellar innings of one-run ball and another spectacular blast from October superhero Giancarlo Stanton that had given New York a lead in the match. sixth inning. Jazz Chisholm Jr., coming off a terribly quiet ALCS, had regained the lead for the Yankees with a leadoff single and some aggressive baserunning to produce a run in the top of the 10th. Cole and Stanton aside, it hadn’t been the smoothest ride for New York to reach the bottom of the 10th with a lead – repeated failures with runners in scoring position and a defensive error by Gleyber Torres lingered as the game progressed – but with only three outs left and everything would be forgotten.

Smith flew to right for a harmless first out, but Lux followed with a five-pitch walk. As effective as Cousins ​​has been as a Yankee, he is prone to losing the zone relatively often, especially against left-handed hitters, and that wildness has resurfaced at a brutally inopportune time. Suddenly, an Ohtani plate appearance was imminent, barring an Edman grounder into a double play. But when Edman hit a hard grounder up the middle that second baseman Oswaldo Cabrera was unable to get to out in time, the threat of much more than just Ohtani emerged for New York. With only one out, Betts and Freeman grabbed their bats and prepared to hit in case Ohtani couldn’t get through.

But first, the dreaded question the Yankees would rather not have answered: Who would face Ohtani?

Boone had two lefty warm-ups to choose from: Nestor Cortes Jr. and Tim Hill. Hill, a journeyman like Cousins, has found a home in the Yankees bullpen as a lateral southpaw who has consistently confused opponents with his unique arm angle and performed well in seven appearances in October. Cortes represents a much more familiar face – a former All-Star who has become a staple of New York’s pitching staff in recent years – but a much bigger unknown at this point. He hadn’t pitched since September 18 after suffering an elbow flexor strain, but had been rehabbing for the past month and had built himself up to the point where New York deemed him worth adding to the World Series roster, especially as a potential counterpart for the crowd. of dangerous left wing bats in the LA lineup.

And with two of those lefty sluggers in Ohtani and Freeman about to put the game on the line, Boone was confident Cortes was the right choice.

“I just liked the game,” he said after his team’s 6-3 defeat. “The reality is he’s been throwing the ball really well the last few weeks as he’s been preparing for this. I knew it would be hard to double Shohei if Tim Hill got him on the ground and then Mookie got behind him.” he’s a tough match there, so I felt convicted in that spot with Nestor.”

And so Cortes trotted off for what was not only the highest assignment of his Major League career, but also the most daunting situation in which a reliever could possibly be involved: a trio of MVPs with two outs to be made.

As Cortes warmed up, the volume at Dodger Stadium reached a new high for the evening as the announced crowd of 52,394 eagerly awaited the opportunity for an Ohtani World Series walk-off. But the anticipation for such a moment was abruptly derailed when Ohtani sent Cortes’ first pitch down the left field line, only to see Alex Verdugo make an excellent grab in foul territory, crashing over the wall and into the stands for a shocking second. out.

Because Verdugo dropped out of the game, the runners were allowed to advance to second and third base. This left first base open, so Boone opted to bring on Betts to set up the left-on-left matchup for Cortes against Freeman, albeit with the bases loaded and Chavez Ravine ready to absolutely explode.

The expected Ohtani and/or Betts moments may have been for naught, but that’s why the Dodgers keep acquiring MVPs. This time it was Freeman’s turn.

Once again, Cortes’ first pitch — a fastball that catcher Austin Wells wanted up and in, but which leaked into Freeman’s nitro zone — was delivered with bad intentions. And this time it had no chance of being caught by anyone other than the crowd of ecstatic Dodgers fans who had stormed the right-field pavilion. About seven minutes after Cortes entered hoping for a Yankees Game 1 victory, Freeman hit the first walk-off grand slam in World Series history. Life comes at you fast in October.

A Yankees bullpen that didn’t allow an earned run through 15 2/3 innings in the ALDS against the Royals began to show cracks against the Guardians in the ALCS, but still managed to record the biggest outs in the biggest moments on road to a series victory in just five games. However, the Dodgers represent a completely different beast for New York’s bullpen to tame. And in a series opener in Los Angeles, in which Boone was seemingly in a position to deploy a fully equipped relief corps — plus an apparent reinforcement in Cortes — in a reasonably favorable order, the Yankees failed to record enough outs to to secure a victory.

This marks the second time this month that the Yankees have been on the losing side of an absolute October classic. Their only loss in the ALCS to Cleveland came primarily, if equally compellingly, in Game 3, a game in which New York also grabbed a late lead but squandered it by giving up a walk-off home run. But as brutal as it was at the time, it was relatively easy — and logical — for New York to maintain a sense of confidence after that heartbreaking loss in Cleveland. Still feeling like they were in firm control of the series, the Yankees were able to fast forward the result and move on with a calmness that was validated as they closed out the series over the next two days.

No such luxury exists in Los Angeles as things stand, as the Yankees have now been eliminated for the first time in a series in October. If you didn’t know exactly how it played out, the Yankees dropping Game 1 in Los Angeles would be a perfectly reasonable outcome to accept at the start of the series. But the sequence of events and combination of poor performances that led to Friday’s dramatic loss to New York were a sobering reminder of just how tough the World Series opponent is — and how much better the Yankees will have to play and pitch better if they keep pace want to keep. with Los Angeles.