LeBron James was hyped to see the Dodgers advance.

The Los Angeles Dodgers knocked off the San Diego Padres with a pitching masterclass in the do-or-die Game 5 at Dodger Stadium on Friday night, holding the Padres to just two hits in a 2-0 win.

There were plenty of celebrities in attendance for one of the most highly-anticipated baseball games on the 2024 calendar, but perhaps none were bigger than Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James. James was rooting the Dodgers on from start to finish, and he was hyped up when they finally pulled out the win. After the game, James expressed his excitement on social media.

“Congrats @Dodgers on Advancing to NLCS!!!!” James wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

James was back in Los Angeles after his Lakers played a preseason game in Milwaukee on Thursday night, and he and the Lakers will get to stay on the West Coast for the remainder of the preseason before they kick their regular season off on Tuesday, Oct. 22 at home against the Minnesota Timberwolves.

As for the Dodgers, they will have a quick turnaround as they prepare to take on the New York Mets in the NLCS, which begins on Sunday in Los Angeles.

How the Dodgers came back and closed out Padres in NLDS

Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images
The Dodgers rescued their season on Friday just a few days after they appeared to be on the ropes against the Padres, and they did it on the side of the field that you may not expect. The superstars in the Los Angeles lineup get most of the headlines, and rightfully so, as Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman and the rest of the order can do a ton of damage at any time.

But that’s not how the Dodgers got the job done in this National League Division Series. This series was won on the mound by a multitude of starters and bullpen arms that shut down an elite Padres lineup for the better part of three games to finish the series.

After falling behind two games to one, Dave Roberts announced that Game 4 would be a bullpen game for the Dodgers, and many fans hit the panic button immediately. However, the Dodgers’ bullpen pitched a gem, using eight arms to throw a shutout in an 8-0 win.

Roberts then turned to Yoshinobu Yamamoto in Game 5. Yamamoto had gotten hit around in Game 1, so it was hard to know what to expect from the Japanese ace in the biggest start of his career, but he delivered a gem. In five innings, Yamamoto didn’t allow any runs and let just three Padres on base. After he exited, the bullpen did even better. Four Dodgers relievers threw four perfect innings to completely shut the Padres down and slam the door on this series.

Expecting the Dodgers to continue pitching at this rate is unrealistic, but it’s no secret that they have a ton of hot arms at the moment. If they can continue to get anything close to the production that they have gotten in the last two games, they will be extremely tough to beat this postseason.

Troy Finnegan is an Associate Editor at ClutchPoints. He graduated from the University of Colorado Boulder in 2023 with a degree in journalism and minors in communications and sports media, as well as a critical sports studies certificate.