“When the final out of Game 7 of the World Series was recorded late Saturday night,” ESPN wrote from Toronto, the Los Angeles Dodgers had “pulled off an improbable, championship-clinching 5-4 victory over the Toronto Blue Jays.” MLB.com called it “Saturday night’s epic battle” and “their 5-4, 11-inning victory in Toronto.” The play that kept them alive came two innings earlier. “With the score knotted 4-4 and the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth,” as ESPN put it, “the Blue Jays had the bases loaded with two outs in the ninth of Game 7,” MLB.com wrote, “with the World Series-winning run just 90 feet away.”
The Dodgers had just made a change. “Pages came into the game as a defensive replacement with one out in the ninth inning and the bases loaded,” MLB.com wrote, and ESPN described him as “Pages, who had just been inserted in the game for his arm strength.” “Pages struggled mightily at the plate throughout the Dodgers’ World Series run,” MLB.com wrote later, and “The struggles were so pronounced that manager Dave Roberts benched Pages for the final three games of the World Series.”
“The next batter, Ernie Clement, hit a 366-foot drive to left-center field,” ESPN wrote, and “Los Angeles left fielder Enrique Hernández tracked the ball near the wall.” “So I’m running full speed, World Series on the line,” Hernández said on the podcast On Base With Mookie Betts, as Dodger Blue reported. “And then I’m like, ‘Alright, I got it.’” “That’s when Pages took charge, leaping and crashing into Hernández while making a jaw-dropping catch,” MLB.com wrote. “He covered 121 feet of ground.” “Out of nowhere I got posterized,” Hernández said, and he told ESPN: “I was going to pull a Willie Mays, and then [Pages] tackled me.”
“Hernandez’s face was buried in the warning track,” ESPN wrote. “So I’m on the ground and I hear silence,” he said on the podcast, and on Jimmy Kimmel Live, as Sports Illustrated reported, “I go down and in my head everything is quiet.” “Behind him, he thought the ball had fallen in and that the game was over,” ESPN wrote. “I was just down because I thought we lost.” Then Pages checked on him. “And he came up to me and said, ‘Are you OK?’” Hernández told ESPN. His own answer ended, “… do you have the ball?” “He’s like, ‘Yeah.’” And: “I’m like, ‘Yeah, let’s go!’”
The Dodgers won it with “a game-winning home run from Will Smith in the 11th,” ESPN wrote. “The Dodgers eventually triumphed in 11 innings to become back-to-back World Series champions,” MLB.com wrote, “the first team since the 2000 New York Yankees to win back-to-back championships,” in ESPN’s words. MLB.com called the play “Dodgers outfielder Andy Pages’ series-saving catch in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game 7,” and the Dodgers later made it a bobblehead, one “which captures the moment when Pages and Kiké Hernández collided in the outfield as the ball found the center fielder’s glove.” “Pages entering the game likely saved the Dodgers’ season,” Dodger Blue wrote.
Fact check
The facts and where they come from
- He was about to make the catch, but his own teammate flattened him. Hernández, to ESPN: “I was going to pull a Willie Mays, and then [Pages] tackled me.” Hernández, on Jimmy Kimmel Live (Sports Illustrated): “as I’m finally about to catch the ball.” ESPN’s live analysis: “And then Andy Pages runs over Enrique Hernandez to make the catch for the third out at the outfield wall.” 182
- His name is Kiké Hernández. ESPN: “Los Angeles left fielder Enrique Hernández tracked the ball near the wall.” 3
- It was Game 7 of the World Series. ESPN: “TORONTO -- When the final out of Game 7 of the World Series was recorded late Saturday night.” MLB.com: “their 5-4, 11-inning victory in Toronto”; “Saturday night’s epic battle.” 14
- Bottom of the ninth, tied 4-4. ESPN: “With the score knotted 4-4 and the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth.” 3
- With two outs, the Blue Jays had the bases loaded. MLB.com: “the Blue Jays had the bases loaded with two outs in the ninth of Game 7.” 5
- Any hit, and Toronto would win it all. MLB.com: “with the World Series-winning run just 90 feet away.” 4
- The Dodgers had just sent in Andy Pages. ESPN: “Pages, who had just been inserted in the game for his arm strength.” MLB.com: “Pages came into the game as a defensive replacement with one out in the ninth inning and the bases loaded.” 14
- He had been benched for slumping at the plate. MLB.com: “Pages struggled mightily at the plate throughout the Dodgers’ World Series run, posting a .211 OPS with 11 strikeouts and no walks across 16 games. The struggles were so pronounced that manager Dave Roberts benched Pages for the final three games of the World Series.” 6
- Then a deep fly sailed to left-center. ESPN: “The next batter, Ernie Clement, hit a 366-foot drive to left-center field.” MLB.com: “Ernie Clement lofted a high fly ball deep into left-center field.” 14
- In left field, Kiké raced back for it. ESPN: “Los Angeles left fielder Enrique Hernández tracked the ball near the wall.” Hernández, on Mookie Betts’s podcast (Dodger Blue): “So I’m running full speed, World Series on the line”; “And then I’m like, ‘Alright, I got it.’” 37
- Out of nowhere, Pages leaped and crashed into him. MLB.com: “That’s when Pages took charge, leaping and crashing into Hernández while making a jaw-dropping catch.” Hernández (Dodger Blue): “out of nowhere I got posterized.” 47
- Face down on the warning track, Kiké heard silence. ESPN: “Hernandez’s face was buried in the warning track.” Hernández (Dodger Blue): “So I’m on the ground and I hear silence.” Hernández (Sports Illustrated): “I go down and in my head everything is quiet.” 178
- He thought the ball had dropped and they had lost. ESPN: “Behind him, he thought the ball had fallen in and that the game was over.” Hernández: “I was just down because I thought we lost.” 1
- Then Pages asked if he was okay. Hernández, to ESPN: “And he came up to me and said, ‘Are you OK?’” 1
- “Do you have the ball?” Kiké asked. Hernández, to ESPN: “… do you have the ball?” 1
- “Yeah,” said Pages. ESPN, in Hernández’s account: “He’s like, ‘Yeah.’” 1
- “Yeah, let’s go!” said Kiké. Hernández, to ESPN: “I’m like, ‘Yeah, let’s go!’” 1
- In the 11th, the Dodgers won the World Series. ESPN: “a game-winning home run from Will Smith in the 11th”; “pulled off an improbable, championship-clinching 5-4 victory over the Toronto Blue Jays.” MLB.com: “The Dodgers eventually triumphed in 11 innings to become back-to-back World Series champions.” 15
- That crash had saved their season. MLB.com: “Dodgers outfielder Andy Pages’ series-saving catch in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game 7”; “The bobblehead, which captures the moment when Pages and Kiké Hernández collided in the outfield as the ball found the center fielder’s glove.” Dodger Blue: “Pages entering the game likely saved the Dodgers’ season.” 57
Sources
- Dodgers steal Game 7 in extras to repeat as World Series champs (November 2025) ESPN
- World Series Game 7, Dodgers v Blue Jays: live updates and analysis (November 1, 2025) ESPN
- Dodgers to give away bobblehead celebrating Pages running over Hernandez for Game 7 catch (July 2026) ESPN
- Ranking the craziest plays from an epic World Series Game 7 MLB.com
- LA’s World Series-saving Game 7 catch is back, in bobblehead form MLB.com
- How Andy Pages went from World Series benching to playing like a star (2026) MLB.com
- Kiké Hernández Details Getting ‘Posterized’ By Andy Pages’ Heroic Catch (November 9, 2025) Dodger Blue
- Kiké Hernandez Thought the Dodgers Lost the World Series When Andy Pages Posterized Him Sports Illustrated
Notes
The game: Game 7, bottom of the ninth, tied 4-4, at Rogers Centre in Toronto on Saturday, November 1, 2025; the Dodgers won 5-4 in 11 innings (ESPN, MLB.com).
Outs: Pages came in “with one out in the ninth inning and the bases loaded” (MLB.com), and a throw home by Miguel Rojas (“Rojas fired a strike to home plate, just in time”) made it two outs before the fly ball. The Short says “The Dodgers had just sent in Andy Pages” and “With two outs, the Blue Jays had the bases loaded,” both true.
The benching: MLB.com says Dave Roberts benched Pages “for the final three games of the World Series”; Dodger Blue says he was benched in Game 6. The Short says only “He had been benched.”
His words differ by telling. To ESPN after the game, his answer to Pages began with a censored expletive and ended “do you have the ball?”; on Mookie Betts’s podcast it was “Forget about me. Did you catch it?”; on Jimmy Kimmel Live he said “my teammate posterized me.” The Short quotes only the ESPN words “Do you have the ball?”; “heard silence” is from his podcast account.
“Saved their season”: MLB.com calls it a “series-saving catch,” and Dodger Blue says Pages’s entering the game “likely saved the Dodgers’ season.”
Kiké Hernández, Andy Pages and everyone else named here are alive. Only game results, reporting by ESPN, MLB.com, Dodger Blue and Sports Illustrated, and Hernández’s own published words are used; Ernie Clement, Miguel Rojas, Will Smith and Dave Roberts are named only for plain game facts. Left out: the talk-show audio and the broadcast footage, and both players’ lives beyond this game and Pages’s public benching.
Pictures: no free photo or video shows the catch or the collision; every picture of it we found is MLB broadcast or agency work, so none is used. Kiké Hernández is running the bases for the Dodgers at Nationals Park in Washington on May 20, 2018 (All-Pro Reels); in the outfield at Citi Field in New York on May 29, 2016 (D. Benjamin Miller); walking head down at a Dodgers–White Sox game in Chicago on July 18, 2017 (TonyTheTiger); and smiling with the Oklahoma City RedHawks, in the minor leagues, on June 7, 2014 (Minda Haas Kuhlmann). Andy Pages is batting at Dodger Stadium on April 15, 2026, in a regular-season game (DewyCakes), and with the Great Lakes Loons in the minor leagues at Lansing in May 2021, seen from behind on May 30 and swinging, in black and white, on May 25 (two by Joel Dinda). The night of Game 7 is seen only in two fans’ photos of the watch party in Nathan Phillips Square, Toronto, on November 1, 2025 (OhanaUnited), cropped to leave out the big screen, which showed the broadcast, and the faces nearest the camera. Rogers Centre is seen with no game on June 25, 2025 (two by Erik Drost) and from the upper deck at a Blue Jays–Mets game on July 1, 2026 (two by ウィ貴公子), not on the night of Game 7. The two teams’ World Series caps were photographed in a shop in Shibuya, Tokyo, on November 10, 2025 (ウィ貴公子); the Dodgers’ World Series parade in Los Angeles on November 3, 2025 (ItalianAce); and the Dodgers receiving their 2025 World Series rings at Dodger Stadium on March 27, 2026 (Spanneraol). The other players, umpires and fans in these photos are not named.
Photo credits
The archive photos in this story
The photographs and illustrations in this story are in the public domain or shared under open licenses; each one is credited below with its license. Tap one to enlarge it, or follow the link to its Wikimedia Commons page for the full record. The narration, captions and graphics in the Short are our own; its music and sound effects are credited below.
Music and sound effects
Music: Mussorgsky, Pictures at an Exhibition: IV. Bydlo (piano) (Musopen, public domain); Schumann, Kinderszenen, Op. 15: No. 1 'Of Foreign Lands and Peoples (Musopen, public domain); Dvorak, Symphony No. 9 'From the New World': II. Largo (Musopen, public domain).
Sound effects: Freesound, CC0.
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