LOS ANGELES — Within the blink of an eye fixed, Zeke Hernandez went from making ready to seize a second of historical past to being thrust proper in the midst of it.
Within the backside of the ninth inning on Monday night time, Hernandez — a contract digicam operator at the moment working for FOX Sports activities — camped out together with his crew on a cart past the center-field wall at Dodger Stadium, setting as much as rush onto the sector for any potential walk-off state of affairs in Recreation 3 of the World Sequence.
They needed to wait just a few hours and plenty of innings, however that second lastly materialized within the 18th inning, when Freddie Freeman crushed a walk-off house run off Blue Jays left-hander Brendon Little. Freeman’s ball sailed over the wall in heart and bounced immediately in entrance of Hernandez, who reached up and snagged the ball on a bobble whereas nonetheless seated on the yellow cart.
Seconds later, Hernandez secured the ball in his pocket and was driving a cart onto the sector to seize the hysteria that overtook Dodger Stadium. An individual in a cart behind him recorded the followers going loopy within the left-field pavilion and captured the right shot on the scoreboard of Freeman’s dad, Fred, emotionally cheering on his son.
“That was fairly loopy,” Hernandez stated. “I didn’t even see it. I’ll be sincere with you. It got here down; I heard it first. I used to be like, ‘We’ve got to go get one thing from one of many carts!’ I get my digicam out ASAP. Then, after I seemed down, on the brink of rock and roll, I heard it and simply occurred to catch it out of the nook of my eye. Simply reflex. … It nonetheless hasn’t actually hit me but. Like, the that means of that ball.”
That’s greater than only a house run ball. It’s a historic artifact. Having additionally blasted a walk-off homer in opposition to the Yankees in final yr’s Fall Traditional, Freeman etched his title in baseball immortality as the one participant in historical past to hit two walk-off World Sequence house runs.
The video of the second was captured by one other member of the crew and was despatched to Hernandez, who rapidly despatched it out to all his family and friends. Not lengthy after, his cellphone was buzzing nonstop with calls and texts from of us who couldn’t imagine what had occurred.
“My entire household is Dodger followers,” Hernandez stated. “So after I despatched them the textual content, my cellphone was blowing up since two o’clock within the morning. My nephews, nieces, brothers and sisters.”
In fact, there was one pure query on everybody’s thoughts.
“Everyone was like, ‘What are you gonna do with the ball?’” Hernandez stated. “I used to be like, ‘I don’t know. We’ll see.’”
For now, Hernandez had FOX Sports activities ship the ball to get authenticated whereas he mulls his resolution. However he does have an thought in his thoughts for what he needs to do with the piece of historical past.
“The appropriate factor to do is give it again [to Freeman],” Hernandez stated. “My buddies are all like, ‘Dude! It’s value some huge cash!’ So that you get torn between two methods.”
Hernandez, 55, isn’t just some random cameraman who occurred to be working the World Sequence. Born and raised in Los Angeles, he grew up and stays a diehard Dodgers fan, recalling his first journey to Dodger Stadium on the age of 5 up within the reserve degree seats alongside together with his household.
His career has led to numerous alternatives to expertise high-profile occasions within the leisure trade, from serving to movie TV sport reveals like “The Value is Proper” to working different sporting occasions within the Los Angeles space like USC soccer, Angels and Rams video games. Whether or not it’s coming to video games as a fan or to work, nonetheless, nothing tops his legendary night time on the job for Recreation 3.
“I’m nonetheless on just a little buzz,” Hernandez stated. “It nonetheless hasn’t hit me, the impression. … I’ll always remember this second. In my profession and in my life. At Dodger Stadium, Blue Heaven, that was superior.”
