The 1981 season in the Major Leagues is remembered for two events: the players’ strike in the summer that led to fewer games being played and the emergence of a 20-year-old Mexican named Fernando Valenzuela, who revolutionized the Dodgers’ campaign and died this Tuesday. He was 63 years old.
Valenzuela, who had signed with the Los Angeles organization just in 1979, had a performance in the 1981 season that remained in the history books: he became the first and only player to win the Rookie of the Year award and the best pitcher (Cy Young Award) in the National League in the same year.
The Mexican pitcher took to the mound in the first game of that season and threw a complete game in the 2-0 victory over the Houston Astros. That was the moment when “Fernandomania” was born, turning Valenzuela into one of the most famous athletes in the United States.
The latest World Series between the Yankees and Dodgers
Due to the players' strike in the middle of the 1981 season, the postseason had a special format for those years, as two teams from each division qualified, which required playing a preliminary round before the League Championship Series.
In the National League, the Dodgers defeated the Astros 3-2 and then in the pennant finals they also defeated the now extinct Montreal Expos 3-2 (they were replaced by the Washington Nationals in 2005). "El Toro" Valenzuela was the winner of Game 5, the decisive one played in Canada.
As champions of the National League, the Dodgers advanced to the World Series to once again face the Yankees, as they had done 10 times before in history and as they had done with defeats in the 1977 and 1978 World Series.
The Yankees won the first two games in New York, and everything seemed to be heading towards a victory for the "Bronx Bombers".
But in Game 3, Fernando Valenzuela took the mound. The Mexican left-hander did not start the game well and allowed four runs in the first three innings. It was then that manager Tommy Lasorda appeared to talk to his pitcher, and in his best Spanish, thanks to his experience as a coach for the Tigres del Licey in the Dominican Republic, he asked the "Toro" if he could hold the Yankees scoreless in the following innings.
Valenzuela complied with the request, the Dodgers took the lead in the fifth inning with two runs and won the game 5-4.
The Los Angeles team took control from there and won the next three games to become champions of the World Series for the first time since 1965. The victory in Game 6 was a crushing 9-2 at Yankee Stadium.
Much has happened since that distant October 28, 1981: Valenzuela played for the Dodgers until 1990, the Yankees did not return to the World Series until 1996, and only in 2024 did both franchises meet again in the “Fall Classic”.