The First Five Seasons, Vol. 2 — Team Moments
Highlighting the best team accomplishments during the first five seasons of the OKC Dodgers era
Welcome back to our retrospective about the first five seasons of the Dodgers affiliation in OKC. In case you missed Vol. 1, we broke things down by the numbers. In this edition we will take a look at the top five team moments.
This list does not include individual games, as that will be featured in the future.
Honorable Mention — July 2019 Home Run Barrage
Yes, more home runs were hit across the board in both Triple-A and the Majors in 2019. But even with that in mind, what the OKC Dodgers did in July 2019 was remarkable.
Over 27 games, the team cranked 62 home runs, marking the second-most in all of professional baseball. Only Las Vegas — who plays in a much more hitter-friendly environment — had more with 65.
This included a stretch of 16 consecutive games with at least one homer July 5–24. It’s the second-longest streak in team history and one game shy of the record set in May 1999. The Dodgers totaled an incredible 43 dingers during that time, and over the final six games of the streak, they hit 26 (!!) homers.
On July 18 at Iowa, the Dodgers set a team single-game record with eight homers. Kyle Garlick went deep three times, and two of those were part of back-to-back jobs with DJ Peters.
5) Setting the PCL record for strikeouts in 2016
The Dodgers went 81–60 in 2016 and won the division largely on the strength of the pitching staff, featuring the likes of Julio Urías, José De León, Trevor Oaks, Brock Stewart, Logan Bawcom and Jharel Cotton among others. The team also had a duo of great catchers in Austin Barnes and Jack Murphy.
On the final day of the regular season in Omaha, the team set a new PCL record for strikeouts when Roy Merritt whiffed Parker Morin.
This began a trend, as the Dodgers proceeded to set a new team and league record for strikeouts in both 2017 and 2019. (In a sign of the times, the PCL team strikeout record has been set anew in each of the last four seasons.)
(Quick aside about the record-setting strikeout: I knew going into the game the team needed just one strikeout to set the record. I made sure the coaches knew and the catcher knew so we could save the ball after it happened. The strikeout is recorded, but nobody is motioning to save the ball, so now I’m waving my arms from the press box like a mad man trying to get someone’s attention. Two pitches later that ball was hit for a home run.)
4) Beginning 2018 with a 15-game home winning streak
In quite the odd quirk, OKC had lost six consecutive home openers entering the 2018 season, and it looked like it was going to be seven straight. The Dodgers trailed Round Rock, 7–3, after seven innings and were still down by three runs entering the bottom of the ninth.
Each of the first four batters of the bottom of the ninth inning walked. After an Alex Verdugo single tied the game, the Dodgers notched the win two batters later on a walk-off hit by Travis Taijeron.
The Dodgers swept the opening homestand, going 7–0, with four walk-off wins, including three that occurred consecutively over the final three games of the homestand against New Orleans.
After a road trip, the team returned home to sweep a five-game series against Iowa. In the series finale, the Dodgers led by by two runs in the top of the ninth when Iowa loaded the bases with none out. Closer Brian Schlitter then notched a strikeout and induced a double play to seal the win.
Following a road series in Memphis, the Dodgers took each of the first three games of their next home set against Colorado Springs before the streak finally came to an end. OKC trailed, 5–0, in the bottom of the ninth before rallying for three runs and bringing the tying run to the plate, but the magic finally wore off in the 5–3 defeat.
It’s the team’s second-longest home winning streak in Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark’s history, falling two shy of the record set in 2013. Incredibly, the Dodgers trailed in the eighth inning or later only to eventually win in six of those 15 games. Prior to 2018, the team’s best start at home was 5–0 in 2006.
3) 86 Wins in 2015
This was the first year of the Dodgers affiliation, and with that naturally comes some unknowns. Also, this was the first season of a new front office and player development regime in Los Angeles, so basically everything was new.
Despite heavy roster turnover with over 330 transactions, the team just kept winning. In theory, when a roster is in flux like that, it usually means more losses than wins. Instead, the Dodgers went 86–58, leading the PCL with the best regular season record and setting a new team record for most wins during the team’s modern PCL era (since 1998). In fact, you have to go back to 1965 to to find an OKC team that won more games in one season.
The 2015 squad didn’t set team records. The longest winning streak was only seven games. They just won and won often.
Even though everyone might not have been there at the same time, the makeup of the roster had a great blend of veterans to go along with up-and-coming young talent. For every David Aardsma, Darwin Barney, Chris Heisey or David Huff, there was a Corey Seager, Scott Schebler, Austin Barnes or Darnell Sweeney. More than one of the veteran players remarked that due to the nature of the team’s roster and competitiveness, they truly felt like they could have competed with Major League teams.
The one constant was the coaching staff. Manager Damon Berryhill’s looser style was a great match for the team, and he was deservedly named PCL Manager of the Year. Pitching coach Scott Radinsky, hitting coach Franklin Stubbs and coach Johnny Washington had to deal with a lot unknowns as well, but they were always positive presences and certainly contributed a lot to the team’s success.
2) 2016 American Conference Championship
Although OKC has been to the playoffs 10 times in 22 seasons since rejoining the PCL in 1998, this was only the third time the team advanced to the PCL Championship Series and so far the only time during the Dodgers affiliation.
To get there, it took a great effort to beat Nashville in the best-of-five American Conference Championship. The Dodgers lost Game 1, running OKC’s losing streak in the playoffs to a hard-to-believe 12 games. Fortunately they bounced back in Game 2, sending the series to Nashville in a 1–1 tie.
The Dodgers had a late lead slip away in Game 3 and lost, pushing them toward elimination. However, the team dominated Game 4 by a score of 7–1, led by a spectacular pitching performance from Alfredo Figaro, and setting the stage for a winner-take-all Game 5.
Without exaggeration, it ended up being one of the most epic games in team history. The Dodgers had an early 3–0 lead before Nashville scored four runs in the third inning, including a controversial go-ahead two-run homer that was initially ruled a foul ball.
The Dodgers scored four runs in the fifth inning to take a 7–4 lead, but Nashville then reeled off five unanswered runs to go in front, 9–7. With two on and one out in the eighth inning, O’Koyea Dickson connected on a three-run homer to regain the lead.
The bottom of the ninth inning was packed with drama and the Dodgers clinging to a one-run lead. The Sounds loaded the bases with one out, but Jacob Rhame garnered consecutive popouts from Matt Olson and Renato Núñez to end the game.
The Dodgers then headed to El Paso to begin the Championship Series. In Game 1, the Dodgers couldn’t hold onto a 5–0 lead and subsequently lost Game 2 as well.
Back in OKC, the team held off elimination with a Game 3 win before falling in a heartbreaking 11-inning loss in Game 4.
To this day, that series is filled with what ifs. What if the Dodgers won Game 1? What if two of their regular outfielders — Corey Brown (paternity leave) and O’Koyea Dickson (injury) — had played the entire series instead of just one full game? What if Alex Verdugo’s fly out to the center field wall in the bottom of the 11th of Game 4 ended up being a walk-off homer instead? (I still don’t know how that ball didn’t go out. It was crushed.)
Until the team wins a championship, those questions will unfortunately linger unanswered. Although the team fell a bit short of the title, it was still a great ride and memorable postseason.
1) The Colorado Springs Comeback
Throughout the 2018 season, the Dodgers and Colorado Springs Sky Sox battled for the American Northern Division. When the schedule was released and it had the teams ending the season against each other in Colorado Springs, it wasn’t far-fetched to think that series could decide the division title. But nobody could have foreseen exactly how it would be decided.
During the penultimate weekend of the regular season, the teams met for a four-game set in OKC. The Dodgers entered with a half-game lead and finished with a half-game lead as the teams split a highly entertaining series.
Things turned sour over the next four days. The Dodgers went to Iowa and dropped three of four games while the Sky Sox won three of four games in Omaha. Colorado Springs now had a 1.5-game lead with five games to play in Colorado to determine the division winner.
The Sky Sox had a game earlier in the season canceled, thus accounting for the half-game difference in the standings. Also, this series was now scheduled for five games after there was a rainout during the Dodgers’ previous trip to Colorado Springs. All in all, the Dodgers had to win four of the five games in order to advance to the playoffs.
The Dodgers led the series opener on Friday, 2–0, at the seventh inning stretch before the Sky Sox went on a tear over the next two innings and won 8–2. The objective was now even more clear-cut: The Dodgers had to win four straight games over the next three days to win the division. And oh yeah, they’d have to do it without several regulars who had gone to Los Angeles as September call-ups.
Saturday was scheduled to be a doubleheader to make-up the aforementioned rainout. The Dodgers trailed by two in the sixth inning of a seven-inning game but rallied to tie things up. It began raining heavily in the bottom of the sixth inning, and the inning was completed with the game still tied.
That’s when things really started to get nutty. Play was halted, the tarp went on the field, and the teams endured a 3-hour, 13-minute delay before it was decided the field would not be playable to resume that evening. The game was suspended and would be completed the next day before playing the regularly scheduled game on Sunday. What was supposed to be Game 2 of the doubleheader Saturday was now moved to Monday and would only be played if necessary.
The Dodgers and Sky Sox picked up play Sunday in a 4–4 tie in the seventh inning and went to extra innings. Will Smith hit a go-ahead two-run homer in the top of the eighth inning and in the bottom of the inning, Brian Schlitter induced a groundout with the bases loaded to seal the victory. In the regularly scheduled game, the Dodgers won a typical Colorado Springs slugfest, 11–8, setting the stage for a division deciding doubleheader on the final day of the regular season. The Dodgers had to win both games, but Colorado Springs had to win just one.
It was basically over from the first pitch. The Dodgers were locked in and won both games by a combined score of 23–5. With each passing inning, it was getting harder and harder to process what was unfolding. The Dodgers pulled it off. They won four elimination games in the span of about 30 hours — on the road nonetheless — to punch their ticket to the playoffs. It was truly a team effort. Everyone on the roster contributed, with standout performances by Connor Joe and Henry Ramos.
The team had a similarly eventful playoff series against the Memphis Redbirds, but this time the magic was on Memphis’ side. Getting to that point was improbable enough. No one had ever seen something like that before and probably won’t again for a long, long time.
