For the second Dodgers game in a row, Shohei Ohtani was intentionally walked to load the bases, and Mookie Betts followed by working his own walk to score a key run. In Monday’s Game 1 of the NLCS, the walk to Betts by Abner Uribe gave the Dodgers the insurance run they needed to eke out a 2-1 win over the Brewers.

“That run in the top of the ninth was huge, obviously 20-20 hindsight,” said Freddie Freeman, who homered earlier in the game for the Dodgers’ other run. “Getting on the road in an environment and taking the first one, it’s huge. You can’t understate that at all.”

Multiple bases-loaded walks in one postseason

Pitcher Jim Palmer (Game 2 of the 1971 World Series) and Ramírez (Game 1 of the 2007 ALCS) are the only players with two bases-loaded walk in the same game. Ramírez also had a bases-loaded walk in 2004 with Boston, giving him four bases-loaded walks in the postseason in his career, the most all time. Betts is tied for second with three — his first came in the 2018 ALDS — along with Yadier Molina.

The most prolific postseason for bases-loaded walks was 2020 with 10, with eight of the bases-loaded walks coming in the first-of-its-kind wild card round as 16 teams made the playoffs after than truncated 60-game regular season. There were nine bases-loaded walks in both 1999 and 2007. So far this year, there are six, and the Dodgers are involved in four of them. Both Edgardo Henriquez and Jack Dreyer walked in a run in a forgettable eighth inning of Game 1 of the wild card series against the Reds.

Ohtani was intentionally walked twice in Game 1 against the Brewers. The first time came in the fifth inning, with Kiké Hernández on second base after a double. With one out, Ohtani was given the free pass, and Quinn Priester induced a double play grounder from Betts to extinguish the rally in what was then a scoreless game.

That makes four intentional walks for Ohtani in these playoffs, and three times Betts has driven in at least a run immediately following. Before Game 2 of the wild card round, Reds manager Terry Francona scoffed at the idea of giving Ohtani a free pass, saying, “You start walking people in that lineup and you’re asking for trouble.”

But in the eighth inning against Cincinnati, Ohtani was intentionally walked and Betts hit an RBI double to pad the Dodgers’ lead.

Ohtani this season has been intentionally walked 21 times with Betts the next batter up. Betts has six hits in 17 at-bats with three doubles, four walks, hitting .353/.476/.529 with 10 RBI.