Nestor Cortes hasn’t forgotten the home run he gave up to Freddie Freeman.

The New York Yankees were thoroughly outclassed in their five-game 2024 World Series loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers. But ask ex-Yankee and current Milwaukee Brewers pitcher Nestor Cortes, and he’ll tell you the series could have just as easily swung the other way.

And he isn’t wrong. For his part, Cortes regrets one pitch he threw in Game 1 that changed the trajectory of the series. In the bottom of the 10th inning with the Yankees leading by a run and one out away from a win, Freddie Freeman came up against Cortes with the bases loaded. He deposited the first pitch he saw into the seats for a walk-off grand slam.

That moment still haunts Cortes.

“I hate how it happened,” he said, per Tyler Kepner of The Athletic. “Trust me, I (wasn’t) able to sleep after that, just because I replayed it in my head every single time.

I guess he was on the right side of the baseball where he hit the home run. But it could have been a pop-up, it could have been a ground ball, it could have been a fly ball. There were so many outcomes with that pitch.”

If Freeman had missed that pitch — or if Cortes hit his spot, the Yankees could have won that game. They also should have won Game 5, but a comedy of errors allowed the Dodgers to claw back and take the clinching game.

“We had done enough to win that game,” the new Brewers starter said of Game 1. “They can talk whatever they want to talk, but we win Game 1 — which we should have — we lost 2 and 3, we win Game 4 and we should have won Game 5. Then we go back to LA up 3 to 2.”

The Brewers see Nestor Cortes as part of their championship formula

Rick Scuteri-Imagn Images
Cortes went from New York to Milwaukee in the trade that sent All-Star closer Devin Williams to the Bronx. Now with the Brewers, Cortes hopes to help the team to its first-ever World Series championship.

General manager Matt Arnold believes that Cortes, who had a 3.77 ERA and 1.153 WHIP in the American League East last year, is part of the winning equation.

“It’s always a combination of things for us,” he said. “Whether it’s present value or future value, we want to try to help the team win a championship, and so we felt like this did a little of both.

You can’t replace a guy like Devin Williams, but the ability to get an established starter like Nestor and a young guy like [Caleb] Durbin, who has a chance to impact our infield, is pretty exciting for us.”