For the first time since 2023, a team other than the Los Angeles Dodgers will be crowned World Series champions — despite their $240 million investment in two-time Silver Slugger Kyle Tucker, their $69 million commitment to three-time Reliever of the Year Edwin Díaz and their successful trade for two-time Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal in August.
The Milwaukee Brewers wrapped up the National League Championship Series against the Dodgers on Thursday at Dodger Stadium. ending the search for Los Angeles to become the first team in Major League Baseball history to three-peat, an expectation not seen as unrealistic for a team with the highest payroll in baseball, led by a four-time MVP in Shohei Ohtani.
And yet, calling the Dodgers’ postseason run a failure doesn’t seem fair — at least not to MLB on FOX, which had high praise for the defending World Series champions and their longtime manager Dave Roberts.
“If they don’t win the World Series, it’s like they had a bad year, you know what I’m saying?” Three-time World Series champion David Oritz said during Thursday’s postgame show. “This game is a tough game to play, and Dave Roberts, even losing tonight, getting busted, I think his career is one of the greatest.
“In the last six years, three world championships is more than believable. I tip my hat to Dave Roberts. He’s a guy who still has a lot to do, staying with the Dodgers organization.”
(Photo by Luke Hales/Getty Images)
Roberts has been under scrutiny since taking over as Dodgers manager in 2016, and this postseason was no exception. After Los Angeles’ Game 3 loss to the Brewers, Roberts was questioned about walking Blake Snell in the seventh and his handling of rookie Josue De Paula.
But for five-time World Series champion Derek Jeter, who was the star of MLB’s last three-peat team, this series was about the resilience of the Brewers, not the weakness of the Dodgers or their manager.
“Dave Roberts, he’s been in our band hundreds of times, it seems,” Jeter said. “He’s classy in both wins and losses. We haven’t seen him lose very often, but he said it: sometimes he tips his hat to the other team. They beat them.
“We can try to sit back and analyze what happened with the Los Angeles Dodgers — they didn’t hit, they didn’t pitch — but they ran into a team that was hot, and sometimes that happens. You hope Dodger fans look at them and they’re proud of how they’ve handled themselves, how they’ve competed the last three years, and they’ve still won the last three years. It.”
Jeter’s former Yankees teammate, Alex Rodriguez, agreed.
“For the Dodgers, you can’t say enough good things about everything they’ve done here over the last decade,” said the 2009 World Series champion. “To pull off a three-peat — Cap, you did it — is almost impossible in this environment today, in 2026.
“And what did they do to follow up? They won 100 games, and they just ran into a saw. They ran into the team that’s been the best team for the last seven months, and they’ve been waiting for this moment right here for 364 days. You could see it in their body language, you could see it in their eyes. They were hungry from the start.”
The Dodgers INVOLVED! 🧹 Derek Jeter, Big Papi & A-Rod react to Brewers’ NLCS elimination
The Brewers will face the winner of the ALCS between the Tampa Bay Rays and Cleveland Guardians in the World Series.
