Takeaways from World Series Game 3: Yankees on brink of elimination after bats remain silent

The home run gave Freeman several milestones to celebrate. According to Sarah Langs of MLB.com, Freeman is the third player in history to hit a home run in Games 1, 2 and 3 of the same World Series, joining Barry Bonds (2002) and Hank Bauer (1958). 

Additionally, this marked Freeman's fifth consecutive World Series game with a homer, tying a record for the longest such streak with George Springer.

Freeman wasn't finished contributing offensively after that, reaching base safely twice later in the game by way of a walk and a fielder's choice. Overall, the 2020 National League MVP is slashing .333/.385/ 1.250 with three homers and seven RBI in the Fall Classic. Freeman's performance has been nothing short of remarkable, especially considering he's playing through a severe right ankle sprain.

Dodgers pitching staff, led by Walker Buehler, shuts down Yankees lineup

Buehler, who missed all of 2023 due to a second Tommy John surgery, entered October as a massive question mark after posting a 5.38 ERA across 16 regular season starts. Despite struggling in his first postseason outing against the San Diego Padres in Game 3 of the NLDS, Buehler has steadily improved with each start, and he delivered his finest performance yet on Monday.

The two-time All-Star allowed just two hits and issued a pair of walks in five scoreless innings, racking up five strikeouts, including four consecutive across the second and third frames.

Even so, Buehler ran into some trouble in the fourth inning. After giving up a one-out double to Yankees DH Giancarlo Stanton, Buehler got third baseman Jazz Chisholm Jr. to line out before allowing a single to shortstop Anthony Volpe. 

However, Yankees third base coach Luis Rojas waved Stanton around third to try and score the team's first run, though the slow-footed 34-year-old was unsurprisingly thrown out at home plate to end the inning. 

With his stellar outing, Buehler became the fourth pitcher in MLB history to post multiple scoreless World Series outings of at least five innings pitched and two or fewer hits allowed, per Langs.

New York's lineup couldn't do much after Buehler was removed from the contest, as the Dodgers bullpen continued to dominate. Six relievers ultimately combined to allow two runs on three hits and four walks while striking out six batters, with the only runs scored coming on a two-run ninth-inning homer by outfielder Alex Verdugo. 

Yankees manager Aaron Boone must continue to shuffle his lineup 

Considering no team trailing 3-0 in World Series history has ever forced a Game 6, let alone come back to win the title, there's probably no move the Yankees can make to spark a miraculous turnaround. Still, with at least one game left to play, New York can only take things day by day and should continue to shake up its ice-cold lineup.

The Yankees made some minor tweaks to the lineup for Game 3, replacing catcher Austin Wells with Jose Trevino and moving Volpe to sixth in the order, which obviously didn't affect the outcome. Nevertheless, with the team now on the brink of elimination, Boone should consider making more drastic lineup alterations for Tuesday's game.

New York must decide what to do with the struggling Aaron Judge, who has one hit in 12 at-bats with seven strikeouts in the World Series. Moving Judge out of the three-hole seems like a must-needed change, though New York can get flexible in how it goes about doing so.

The Yankees could swap Judge with the cleanup hitter Stanton, or perhaps moving the soon-to-be two-time American League MVP into the leadoff spot could be what he needs to get his mind right. After all, Judge has stepped up to the plate with at least one runner on base in the first inning in 10 of New York's 12 postseason games. 

In those at-bats, he’s 0-for-10 with seven strikeouts, as NJ Advance Media's Max Goodman pointed out.