The Dodgers have been here before

When I was in the sixth grade, the Dodgers were in the World Series against the Yankees. It was 1981.  My sixth grade history teacher, Mrs. Dunn, was from New York. She was a Yankees fan.

One of her assignments was to create a timeline for the school year. We were supposed to bring in significant currents events to put on the timeline, a series of notecards posted around the room. By the end of the year it was supposed to chronicle all the important events from September 1981 to June 1982.

Being a kid from Los Angeles, the San Fernando Valley specifically, I was a Dodgers fan. I played Little League. I wasn’t a very good baseball player, but I was a very good baseball fan.

It was the year of Fernando-mania. Fernando Valenzuela was a rookie pitcher for the Dodgers. He was a pudgy little Mexican kid, a lot like me, the token Mexican kid going to a private school in Van Nuys. The Yankees had Reggie Jackson, Mr. October, who crushed the Dodgers in the World Series in 1977 and 1978. The Dodgers-Yankees rivalry was as intense as it had ever been. Mrs. Dunn did not hide that she was a Yankees fan. And of course, I was not shy about being a Dodgers fan.

The Yankees won the first game of the World Series. Mrs. Dunn was so excited she brought in her own card that read: Yankees win the World Series.

Not exactly. The Yankees only won the first game of the World Series. They needed to win four games to win the whole World Series. I couldn’t believe Mrs. Dunn, being such a passionate Yankees fan, did not know this. I couldn’t resist pointing it out to her when she put up her card on the timeline.

“That’s not right,” I told her. “The Yankees have to win three more games.”

“They absolutely don’t,” she said. “The Yankees are World Series champions.”

“Game 2 is tonight,” I said. “The series is far from over.”

But Mrs. Dunn didn’t believe me. She insisted on keeping her card on the timeline and refused to admit the Yankees did not win the World Series yet.

The next day, after the Yankees won Game 2, I brought to school a newspaper with the stories about how the Dodgers were down 2-0 in the World Series. All the Los Angeles newspapers were writing about how the Dodgers were going to lose to the Yankees again. I tried to ignore the doom and gloom surrounding the Dodgers. All I needed was evidence that the World Series was, in fact, far from over and the Yankees had to win two more games to win the World Series.

I showed the newspaper stories to Mrs. Dunn. Then I made a deal with her. If the Dodgers won the World Series, I would add one card to the timeline and not have to add any more for the rest of the school year. If the Yankees won, Mrs. Dunn could keep her Yankees win the World Series card on the timeline and I would never mention her original mistake again.

The first two games were in New York. The Yankees took full advantage of being the home team. But the next three games were at Dodger Stadium. It was the Dodgers turn to be the home team. They won the next three games and were heading back to New York, up 3-2 in the World Series and needing one more win to take the championship. More importantly, the Dodgers were one game away from helping me get out of a tedious, year-long history assignment. Mrs. Dunn would probably never want to talk to me again either, but that was a price I was willing to pay.

The Dodgers won Game 6, won the World Series, 4-2, won four games in a row and I turned in my last card to the timeline before Halloween.

The 2020 Dodgers find themselves down 2-0 to the Atlanta Braves in the National League Championship Series. It doesn’t look good for the Dodgers. It is probably a good time for some sixth-graders to make deal with their teachers to get out of some pointless homework.