Atlanta Braves back in World Series for first time since 1999 after upsetting

ATLANTA — For the first time since 1999, the Atlanta Braves are going back to the World Series.

Eddie Rosario continued a torrid postseason with a three-run homer just inside the foul pole in the fourth inning, breaking a 1-1 deadlock and propelling Atlanta to a 4-2 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Saturday. One season after the Braves lost to the Dodgers in a seven-game National League Championship Series, Atlanta knocked off the defending champions in six.

The Dodgers got the tying runs on base with no one out in the seventh, but lefty reliever Tyler Matzek came on and struck out three straight to electrify a thundering Truist Park gathering. The last of the three was former MVP Mookie Betts.

Rosario, who was named NLCS MVP, went 2-for-3 with a walk and finished the NLCS with a .560 average, 1.040 slugging percentage, three homers and nine RBIs in six games.

According to Rosario, he’s not done.

“It’s truly a great moment, not just in my career, but in my life as well, but I want more,” Rosario said. “I want to win the World Series.”

The loss ends the title defense of the Dodgers, who won the World Series after last year’s pandemic-shortened season. It was an abrupt end for Los Angeles, which won 106 games during the regular season and beat the 107-win San Francisco Giants in the NL Division Series.

Instead, it’s the 88-win Braves who take the NL pennant during a season in which they did not climb over the .500 mark until Aug. 6. According to Elias, that’s the latest first-day-over-.500 date ever for a team that reached the World Series. The previous record was Aug. 3, held by another version of the franchise — the 1914 Boston Braves, known to history as the “Miracle Braves.”

While the 2021 Braves looked like a long shot to end their pennant drought when the postseason began, nothing about the way Atlanta dismantled the Milwaukee Brewers during the NLDS and the Dodgers during the NLCS seemed miraculous.

“There was a big upside to our club the last two months,” Braves general manager Alex Anthopoulos said after the game. “And if you’re into things like run differential, the Giants, L.A. and us were right there in the top three. We felt that we had the talent to do it.”

The pennant is the latest step for a franchise that began a long rebuild during the middle part of the past decade and reemerged as a contender in 2018. This season marked the Braves’ fourth straight season in the playoffs. Saturday’s win snapped a string of 12 straight postseason runs for the franchise without a World Series appearance, tied with the Athletics for the longest streak of that kind.

Braves starter Ian Anderson held the Dodgers to one run over four innings, before giving way to a pinch-hitter during Atlanta’s fourth-inning rally. A.J. Minter came on after Anderson and set down all six batters he faced, striking out four in a dominating performance.

The dual dominance of Minter and Matzek, a pair of lefty relievers from Texas, preceded a perfect ninth by closer Will Smith and continued a strong playoff run for the Atlanta bullpen. Opponents are now 0-for-15, including 11 strikeouts, with runners in scoring position against Matzek during the playoffs.

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