Bigly

These are weird times for Los Angeles sports. The Kings are off to a franchise best 4-0-1, which admittedly isn’t saying much besides that they are horrendous starters. The Rams are 4-2, which has matched their win total from last season already (also pretty sad). The Dodgers are on the verge of a World Series appearance, their first since they last won in 1988, which shows how discombobulated they have been since then. On a much smaller note, the Galaxy are the worst team in American soccer (besides the men’s national team itself), and I don’t think that’s happened with them ever.

Back to the Dodgers though...

This team is playing like the Kings in 2012, except they had a regular season where they were the best team in baseball. Not a record where they pulled a rabbit out of their ass at the last moment to even make the playoffs. The homer in game two by Justin Turner is easily the biggest home run the franchise has had since the 1988 Series. Yes, it beats:

• The Charlie Culberson (who had a slugging percentage that was in the negatives probably) extra innings walk off home run to clinch the division and was Vin Scully’s last home game.
• The Steve Finley grand slam walk off to win the division against the Giants.
• The late inning Divisional Series clincher smacked by Juan Uribe after he botched two bunt attempts.
• Andre Ethier in general. Though it appears to have cost him his hair.

It’s probably on par with the Lakers crazy ass post-season antics, like the Robert Horry dagger against a horse shit made up team in Sacramento and the Derek Fisher hail mary he made with less than a second to go against the Spurs. There was also the Ron Artest/Metta World Peace late game, ill advised, yet incredibly made three pointer against the Celtics in game seven during the Finals.

The Clippers...well, they don’t have these sort of moments happen for them (only to them), the Rams have been here for like a month, and MLS changes their tie game formats regularly so the Galaxy’s big goals sort of lose their shine.

But the Kings...if you want to talk about a team that has had every big goal moment at the craziest possible moment to win, the stretch during 2012 to 2014 had it. To recap:

• The Jarret Stoll first round overtime clincher against the Canucks in 2012.
• Dustin Penner with the overtime winner to finish off the Coyotes, sending the Kings to their first Finals appearance since 1993.
• Anze Kopitar scoring a overtime winner in game one against the Devils in the Finals.
• Jeff Carter scoring a overtime winner in game two against the Devils in the Finals.
• Trevor Lewis capping a crazy comeback against the Sharks in 2013 that had Marc-Edouard Vlasic smiling like an idiot.
• Marian Gaborik with a last second goal to send game one against the Ducks to overtime in 2014.
• Marian Gaborik with a game one winning goal against the Ducks in overtime.
• Alec Martinez finishing off the Blackhawks via Nick Leddy’s sad dick in overtime of game seven.
• And the pinnacle of big SPORTS moments, the Martinez Cup winning goal in overtime against the Rangers. Jazz hands, baby.

Maybe the Kings get to overtime a ridiculous amount of times. Deep playoff runs also help generate more moments too, obviously. Hockey also has less scoring, so a late goal is going to be blown up infinitesimally more. Whatever the case, the Kings have been remarkably fortunate in that category.

Sure, you can even included the Eric Belanger overtime winner in the original it was 3-0 comeback, and Adam Deadmarsh finishing off the monster stacked Red Wings in 2001. There was, uh, not a whole lot between then and now admittedly.

What I am saying is Montreal’s biggest sports moment in the past two decades was the Expos moving away and resulting in a Nationals team that has never won a playoff series.