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On a cool desert evening in Phoenix, with the weight of a championship pressing against them, the defending World Champion Cleveland Indians refused to yield.
Behind seven steady innings from left-hander Marquos Philippon, the Indians staved off elimination, defeating the Arizona Diamondbacks 7–3 to send the World Series back to Cleveland — and in doing so, reminded everyone that this resilient club is not yet ready to surrender its crown.
Philippon, the 29-year-old from San Carlos del Zulia, Venezuela, was composed and efficient. He scattered eight hits, allowing only one earned run while inducing a stream of weak contact. It wasn’t overpowering — it was resourceful. The kind of performance you see from a pitcher who understands not just how to throw, but how to win.
And in the seventh inning, with the game hanging in the balance in a tie game, it was shortstop Chris Alfonso who came through. A single up the middle — not a majestic home run, not a highlight-reel drive, but a simple, timely base hit — that put Cleveland ahead for good. It was the kind of hit that echoes through the dugout, that reminds a team that sometimes one swing, one moment, can change everything.
Catcher Willie Cobos added a triple and two runs batted in, while M. Saldana’s two-run single provided breathing room in the fourth inning as Cleveland put up four in that decisive seventh inning. On the other side, Arizona’s bats — so potent just 24 hours earlier — were quieted. After a strong start by O. Arispe and T. Flores, the Diamondbacks simply couldn’t solve Philippon, or closer M. Grondin, who worked the final two innings with typical precision.
So the series shifts now to Jacobs Field — the lakefront ballpark in Cleveland where the Indians have thrived all season — for Game 6 on Wednesday. Arizona still leads three games to two, but momentum, as it so often does in October, has begun to drift.
Final score again from Phoenix: Cleveland 7, Arizona 3. The champions are still alive.
And as we’ve seen so many times across the generations — from the ’75 Reds to the ’86 Mets to the 2011 Cardinals — baseball’s most enduring truth holds firm: in this game, it’s never over until that 27th out.
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