Dodgers News: With Nerves of Steel, Dodgers Pull off the Wheel Play
PHILADELPHIA — The play everyone will remember from Game 2 wasn’t a swing. It was a bunt and a blur of gray shirts moving like clockwork. With nobody out, Nick Castellanos on second and Bryson Stott squaring, the Dodgers rolled out the wheel play and stole the inning back. Max Muncy charged. Mookie Betts tore for third. One throw, one tag, and the threat changed shape.
Dave Roberts said the call crystallized during the mound visit. “It was an impromptu play,” he said. “I told Mookie, you know Stott’s going to bunt. He’s a good bunter, so let’s run a wheel play. Max, be aggressive, field it, and Mookie, get over there and beat Castellanos.” Roberts tipped his cap to the execution. “Those guys executed it to perfection. It was a lot tougher. They made it look a lot easier than it was. For me that was our only chance to win that game in that moment.”
Muncy walked through the decision from the infield huddle. “Wheel play is not something that we traditionally do,” he said. “As soon as we got in that situation, me, Mookie and Tommy immediately started talking about, hey, we’ve got to try something different. We can’t just play the standard bunt play.” He said Roberts signed off during the pitching change. “I’m going to credit Mookie. It was his idea. He was saying, ‘We’ve got to go wheel play.’ We talked about how we were going to do it, and we executed it to perfection.”
Freddie Freeman explained the chessboard before the pitch. “It means there’s going to be no one at second base,” he said. “So that’s when I chimed in. I said, ‘If he bunts to third base, Max, you throw to Mookie. Tommy’s going to first. I’ll sprint to second.’ If it’s not coming to me, that’s why you saw me running to second.” He added that the idea had been in their back pocket. “We were just coming up with a plan on the wheel play to make sure we still had every base covered so he couldn’t go home to second. And they pulled it off perfectly.”
Roberts also highlighted how Betts disguised his break. “He’s a baseball player,” Roberts said. “You can organically create a play, and it doesn’t usually happen with a tag play at third. He disguised it, and the foot speed was obviously much more than Castellanos. Max had to field it and lead Mookie, and then on the run Mookie still had to make a tag play. Tough play, and he hung in there with Castellanos bearing down. Mookie’s growth has been incredible.”
The first out at third did more than clear a base. “It’s huge,” Muncy said. “You get that guy off second base, you get him out there, and that changes everything in that inning.” Asked what it said about Betts calling for it at shortstop in his first postseason at the position, Muncy didn’t hesitate. “It’s just a really smart baseball play,” he said. “For him to immediately come right to me and talk about doing it shows his intuition. It’s second to none. It doesn’t matter what position you put that guy at; he knows what’s going on. It’s awesome to be his teammate.”
Betts traced the origin of the idea to a midseason lesson. “It’s another learning behavior,” he said. “I’ve got to give that credit to Miggy Rojas. We did it earlier in the year in Anaheim and I remember asking him when’s a good time to do it. He said in a do-or-die situation.” Betts said the message stuck. “I had never been in that situation in a game like this. So I just trusted it and made a decision and it worked.”
Comfort isn’t exactly the word Betts used. “I don’t know if it was very comfortable,” he said. “But somebody’s got to do it. If there was ever a good time to make a decision and roll with it, that was the time.” On the mad dash to third, he shrugged. “God blessed me with some athleticism, so I was able to put it on display there.”
The timing mattered. “To me that was a do-or-die situation,” Betts said. “I think them tying the game turns all the momentum. If we can find a way to stop it, that would be great. I just made a decision and rolled with it.” He also pointed to trust from the dugout. “Dave trusts his guys,” Betts said. “We’ve been together for years. We have an idea of what each other can do. Doc kind of called on us and said, ‘You guys figure it out,’ and we did.”
Freeman circled back to Betts’ leap to short this year. “Hopefully everyone realizes how hard it is to switch positions and then do it at an elite level that Mookie has done,” he said. “We were talking about doing a wheel play a couple of weeks ago in a certain situation as well. That’s been on our mind to bring out in that situation, and that was the perfect time to do it.”
Muncy added that this isn’t a play teams spam in 2025. “We don’t really even practice the wheel play,” he said. “With pitchers not hitting, it’s not a play we really run, because there are very few times you’re 100 percent sure a guy is going to bunt.” That made the read, the break, and the throw even more precise.
One bunt. One plan. One out that flipped the script. As Roberts put it, “They executed it to perfection.” And as the Dodgers jogged off the field, the Phillies’ rally was stalled before any more damage could be done.
Have you subscribed to the Bleed Los Podcast YouTube channel? Be sure to ring the notification bell to watch player interviews, participate in shows & promotions, and stay up to date on all Dodgers news and rumors!
