A Dreary World Series Bursts to Life in Game 6

HOUSTON — They call it the Fall Classic, but the name does not always apply. The World Series can be lopsided, as most of the games have been in the 115th version this year. It needed a night like Tuesday, when the Washington Nationals and the Houston Astros staged a thriller that officially made this a World Series unlike any other.

Never before had the road teams won each of the first six games of a World Series. Now they have, after a trio of Nationals stars — Stephen Strasburg, Juan Soto and Anthony Rendon — forced a winner-take-all finale.

The Nationals’ 7-2 victory in Game 6 featured eight and one-third steely innings from Strasburg, a comeback against Justin Verlander and three crucial home runs: from Adam Eaton to tie the game, from Soto to put Washington ahead and from Rendon to put it out of reach.

Manager Dave Martinez was not around to see the end; he was ejected during the seventh inning stretch, when a coach had to restrain him from charging an umpire after Trea Turner was called out for interference two batters before Rendon’s home run.

That controversy will generate debate, at least, at a time when baseball needs to break through into the national sports conversation. So will the oddity of Alex Bregman carrying his bat all the way to first base on his home run trot in the first, and Soto imitating him after his mammoth, Barry Bonds-style blast in the fifth.

The efforts of Strasburg, Soto and Rendon were legacy-defining moments — big stars doing big things — and while Verlander is a sure Hall of Famer, he is now the first pitcher ever to make at least seven World Series starts without a victory.

It all added up to produce the fifth Game 7 of the 2010s: more than the 1990s and the 2000s combined, and a fitting end to a decade of World Series joy for some starving franchises and painful near-misses for others. No decade has ever included so few wins in the Series by a New York team (just one, by the Mets in 2015), and it was the first since the 1950s with seven clinchers by the visitors.

The Nationals can make it eight on Wednesday if they keep up the pattern of this Series. They stole the first two games here in Houston, then were stomped for three nights in Washington. The Astros’ emphatic showing at Nationals Park — they won by a combined score of 19-3 — brought the Series back to Houston, where the city was ready to celebrate its championship clincher at home since the Rockets won the N.B.A. Finals in 1995.

The stars of that team, Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler, handled first-pitch duties before Game 6. The games in Washington were notable for who did not throw a ceremonial first pitch: President Trump, who, so far, is the first sitting president since Theodore Roosevelt to not do the honors at an M.L.B. game at some point in his administration. Teddy did appear on the field at Nationals Park — in mascot form, anyway — but Trump watched Game 5 from a suite. He was roundly booed when shown briefly on the scoreboard.

That was an off-the-field moment, of course, like a few others that have commanded attention at this World Series: the firing of an Astros executive for boorish postgame behavior after the pennant clincher; the poorly timed neck injury for Max Scherzer that kept him from pitching Game 5; the fan who saved his beers while taking a home run off the midsection.

On the field, we had the Juan Soto Game for Washington in the opener — a homer, a double, a single, a steal and three runs batted in, way back when he was still 20 years old — and a dazzling five shutout innings from the Astros newcomer Jose Urquidy in Game 4, when Alex Bregman belted just the third World Series grand slam of this century. Gerrit Cole was dominant in Game 5, but Scherzer’s absence took the glitz from what could have been an epic duel.

Still, it was impressive to witness the resilience of the Astros, who marched into Washington — which had not hosted the World Series since 1933 — and won without a hint of drama. It was not surprising for a team that has exceeded 100 victories in each of the last three seasons, though the roster does include 15 players who were not active for the Astros’ Series triumph in 2017.

“What have I learned about the older group that’s been here is their calmness in the World Series has doubled and tripled and multiplied,” Manager A.J. Hinch said before Game 6. “What I’ve learned from the guys that haven’t been here before — and they’re not necessarily young — is how much fun it is to do this for the first time.

“And so I see it as sort of a dual group of guys that have all come together, and they’re sharing their experiences, whether it’s Gerrit Cole’s intensity being in the first World Series of his career to a World Series M.V.P. in George Springer that just stays the course and then hits a huge home run to separate us in Game 5. That’s been fun for me, because this is a true team.”

Yet however much it would mean to veterans like Cole and Michael Brantley and rookies like Urquidy and Yordan Alvarez, a second Astros championship would not resonate as much nationally as their 2017 title. That World Series was one of the decade’s most riveting matchups: the first appearance by the Los Angeles Dodgers since 1988 and the first victory for a Houston franchise that started in 1962.

The 2017 World Series sometimes bordered on the absurd, with a record 25 homers in seven games, but it included everything a fan could want. It was book-ended by pitching masterpieces (Clayton Kershaw in Game 1 and Charlie Morton in Game 7), with two extra-inning victories by Houston in between. There was a clear hero (Springer, who hit .379 with five homers) and a clear goat (the Dodgers’ Yu Darvish, who lost twice with a 21.60 earned run average). From start to finish, it was the best World Series of the decade.

The most enduring story line, of course, came the year before, when the Chicago Cubs tasted glory for the first time since 1908. To do it, they had to overcome a three-games-to-one deficit against another luckless franchise, the Cleveland Indians, and a final body blow from Rajai Davis, who tied Game 7 with a laser-beam homer in the eighth inning. A rain delay, a rally in the 10th and the first career save by Mike Montgomery gave the Cubs the crown.

The best pitching performance of the decade? That’s easy: It came from the Giants’ Madison Bumgarner, who stifled the Kansas City Royals in relief for five innings to clinch Game 7 in 2014, two days after pitching a shutout in San Francisco.

The best offensive performance? Also easy: It came from David Ortiz of the Boston Red Sox in 2013, when he batted an outrageous .688 (11 for 16) with eight walks and two homers against St. Louis to earn his third championship ring.

The best baserunning? That could belong only to Eric Hosmer of the Royals in 2015, when he dared the Mets’ Lucas Duda to throw him out at the plate on the back end of a grounder to David Wright in the ninth inning of Game 5. With a clean throw, the Mets win and give the ball to Jacob deGrom for Game 6 in Kansas City. (It was not a clean throw.)

But the best game, and moment, of all came in St. Louis in 2011, when the Cardinals trailed five times against the Texas Rangers in Game 6, yet kept roaring back for a 10-9 victory in 11 innings.

Twice, the Rangers needed one strike to clinch their first championship, and twice they failed: when David Freese lashed a game-tying triple off Neftali Feliz in the ninth, and when Lance Berkman looped a game-tying single off Scott Feldman in the 10th. Freese won it with a homer off Mark Lowe in the 11th, then helped the Cardinals take Game 7 to earn the series M.V.P. Award.

Freese retired this month, after hitting .500 for the Dodgers in his last postseason series, a five-game loss to the Nationals. It was his sixth postseason series hitting at least .348.

“It’s just opportunity, I always come back to that,” Freese said by his locker after a three-hit night in Washington. “There’s a lot of guys that would have had a hell of an October, but they never got the shot or didn’t have a lot of chances. People remember stuff you didn’t do well, and people remember the stuff you do really well.”

The Nationals and the Astros now have one more game, and one more chance in Houston to do some things really well in late October, and make even more memories to linger long after the final out.