Freddie Freeman tumbled down the dugout stairs and into the camera well at Dodger Stadium on Wednesday night, chasing a foul popup off the bat of Kansas City's Isaac Collins during the eighth inning. The Dodgers first baseman stayed down briefly before being checked out by the training staff, then remained in the game — though he later admitted just about everything hurt.
Teammate Miguel Rojas and several Royals players and coaches rushed into the visiting dugout to help Freeman up immediately after the fall, according to Sports Illustrated. Freeman did not hit his head in the fall, and he later told reporters he was in good spirits despite the scare, per ABC7 Los Angeles. Still, the toll was evident. “I am sore,” Freeman said, according to the station. “Kneecaps are sore, shoulders sore, hands sore, wrists sore.”
Freeman Exits After the Eighth, Dodgers Finish the Job
Freeman finished the top of the eighth inning on defense before heading down to the clubhouse, ABC7 reported. Tommy Edman pinch-hit for him in the bottom half of the inning, and Kiké Hernández slid over to first base for the ninth to help close things out, per the same account from the station and corroborated by Sports Illustrated.
The Dodgers didn't miss a beat. Los Angeles beat the Royals 4-2 to complete a three-game sweep, powered by home runs from Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Hunter Feduccia, along with 6.1 innings of four-hit pitching from starter Eric Lauer, according to the Associated Press. Reliever Landon Knack, recalled from Triple-A Oklahoma City earlier in the day to replace optioned pitcher Seth Halvorsen, closed it out with a 2.67-inning save — his third career major league save covering a heavily used bullpen, the AP reported. The win marked Los Angeles' fourth in five games after a rough patch earlier this month.
Roberts Says No Call-Up Planned, Freeman Day-to-Day
Manager Dave Roberts told reporters afterward that Freeman was expected to be down Friday but that the team does not plan to call up a replacement from the minors, classifying him as day-to-day, per ABC7. Roberts said the Dodgers avoided a more serious outcome, according to the outlet. Freeman reported that he fell mostly on his left hand and shoulder and said he didn't expect to need X-rays, a detail Sports Illustrated also noted in its coverage of the incident.
Freeman's durability makes any missed time notable — he's played more than 2,000 major league games across 16 seasons with the Atlanta Braves and Los Angeles Dodgers, per Baseball Reference. Early in his career, Freeman put together a 234-consecutive-game streak before a wrist sprain ended it in 2015. He also famously played through a severely sprained right ankle during the Dodgers' 2024 championship run, when he earned World Series MVP honors on the strength of a walk-off grand slam that later sold for $1.56 million at auction.
A Familiar Hazard for MLB Stars
Wednesday's spill echoed a similar scare from March 2024, when Philadelphia Phillies star Bryce Harper cartwheeled over a low photographer-well railing chasing a foul ball at Citizens Bank Park, an incident that pushed the Phillies to raise the railing to match the adjacent dugout height, according to the Associated Press. Major League Baseball mandated extended protective netting from dugout to dugout across all 30 ballparks by 2018 to protect fans, but field-level camera wells and dugout stairwells remain exposed without soft barriers for fielders chasing pop-ups, per Newsday.
For now, the Dodgers sit atop the National League West with a 70-48 record, a 7.5-game lead over the second-place Arizona Diamondbacks, according to StatMuse figures cited in the AP's report. Whether Freeman avoids a stint on the injured list will be closely watched in the days ahead as Los Angeles works to protect that division cushion down the stretch.
