The Dodgers World Series strategy had so little respect for Aaron Boone and the Yankees

Often, disillusioned fans in sports expect talent to equal success. At the professional level of any sport, the difference in talent level between two teams is more marginal than it seems. Ultimately, it’s the organizations that win games that build a team instead of just collecting talent.

The 2024 world series batting lines suggest that the New York Yankees may have emerged victorious from the battle Los Angeles Dodgers. New York finished with a .212 average, nine home runs and 24 runs. Los Angeles finished with a .206 average, seven home runs and 25 runs.

But in the end, the World Series wasn’t decided by those numbers. It wasn’t determined by the money spent on the grilles. It wasn’t even decided by Shohei Ohtani. The clincher was the fundamental difference between the two clubs: while the Yankees were gathering talent, the Dodgers were building a team.

The Dodgers told their players during scouting meetings that the Yankees were built on talent rather than fundamentals. Joel Sherman of the New York Post reports this. Los Angeles knew the Yankees would beat themselves with self-inflicted mistakes. All they had to do was put the ball in play and watch the Bronx Bombers implode.

The Dodgers noted that the Yankees were the worst baserunning team in the Majors by almost every metric. The team’s analyzes also showed that the Yankees had the worst-positioned outfield in the Majors. There was no command on the relay throws and players like Jazz Chisholm Jr. often just stood still.

Ultimately, details like this made all the difference. Even after the Yankees took a five-run lead in Game 5, all the Dodgers had to do was wait for New York to blow the lead for themselves. Aaron Judge dropped a routine line drive to center field. Chisholm was unable to catch a rebounded throw from Anthony Volpe after an attempted force out at third base. Gerrit Cole stopped his chase to first base on a grounder by Mookie Betts.

Meanwhile, the Dodgers were suffocating the Yankees.

“Baseball is about execution, right?” Nestor Cortes said after Game 5. “If you don’t execute and the other team does better than you, then obviously they’re going to win. And that’s what we ran into in the series, where they execute a lot of plays. And I have since Game 1 and 2 said it felt like they did everything right. They got Mookie Betts in right field and every ball off the wall, he kept it to one, and stuff like that, it’s just like you. We can’t capitalize on it and when we made mistakes, they took advantage of them, so that’s huge.”

“It comes down to what it always comes down to: you have to limit mistakes,” Judge said. “You don’t give your opponent a chance to breathe.”

After a rollercoaster season, it was the execution and fundamentals – along with a magical performance from Freddie Freeman – that helped the Dodgers secure their eighth World Series championship.