On June 24, Grimace, the Mets’ mascot, threw out the first pitch for his home team, and (suddenly) the team’s fortunes flipped from pretenders to contenders. Later, the Dodgers vanquished the Mets, countering Grimace’s magic with something more powerful, even mystical, “The Dragon Ball Fusion Dance.”
There wasn’t anything initially particular about the Spring Training game between the Dodgers and Guardians this past March 1st. Projected ace pitcher Tyler Glasnow had adhered to proper Spring load management, having tossed three scoreless innings while tallying five strikeouts and zero hits across those frames. The leadoff MVP trio consisted of Mookie Betts and Shohei Ohtani, who had yet to assume his role in that spot after Mookie was sidelined with a wrist injury following a hit by a pitch in June.
On this day, Shohei was hitting second, and MVP number 3, Freddie Freeman, was hitting next. The game progressed with a summary of runners cashing in on ground ball singles and sacrifice flies. That was until the bottom of the 4th inning when Kike Hernandez sharply stroked a double into the left field gap.
That’s when Kike rounded first and eased up as he approached second base. There was no need to slide, so he stepped on the bag and turned towards the Dodgers dugout. However, something was very different about how this turn was conducted. Kike lifted his right knee over his left and arched both arms over his head, finally pointing his fingers in unison to the left. He wasn’t showboating. He was introducing the 2024 Dodgers to the Dragon Ball Fusion Dance. The move would spread through the lineup and later become the emblem of success for this magical 2024 Dodgers team.
The Fusion Dance is a work in progress but is designed to represent a pose that two or more players can conduct in unison to create one single, superior entity. In this case, that superior entity is the high-powered Dodgers offense and its heavily skilled pitching staff. Every player, when they reach base–and on occasion, a pitcher following a successful inning or strikeout–will initiate the fusion dance, and the dugout will immediately follow suit.
The result, when correctly performed, according to DragonBall Wiki fandom, is the creation of a superior being whose power is multiplied several-fold over that of the individual fusion dancer. Who could argue with this supernatural connection?
The Dodgers, as a team of mega superstars, were forced to endure a season of controversies and prolonged injuries to impact players. The implications of these could have easily fractured and rendered irrelevant a lesser, unfused, and ill-focused group. According to anime creator Akira Toriyama, it is possible to merge and create fusion among players no matter how harsh the conditions are, as long as the players attempt to follow the technique correctly.
This Dodgers team is committed to adhering to Akira Toriyama’s teachings. They are now very close to eliminating the New York Yankees and becoming the 2024 World Series Champions.
Dragon Ball fans would only come to expect this outcome against a talented but ultimately unfused Yankee team. Evidence of this came in game one of the World Series when Mookie Betts reached first to load the bases and immediately fused the dugout, who, in turn, fused the Freddie Freeman towards crushing the first pitch that he saw from Nestor Cortes halfway up the right-center-field bleachers, completing the most incredible ending to a World Series game in the entire storied history of baseball. Within the realm of Dragon Ball fusion, this act was just another day at the office, a natural display of the perfectly fused dominance and defeat of the unfused.
The 2024 Los Angeles Dodgers have had more than their fair share of obstacles to overcome. Early controversies involving the gambling scandal with Shohei Ohtani’s trusted friend and interpreter, whose actions threatened to fragment and defuse Ohtani’s legendary 2024 season before it even began. There were also terrible injuries that sidelined committed fusion starter Mookie Betts for weeks leading up to the All-Star break. In addition to these, there became the complete breakdown, via injury, of the starting rotation.
Glasnow was lost for the end of the season and playoffs, as were future Hall of Famer Clayton Kershaw, Gavin Stone, Tony Gosolin, Emmet Sheehan, and for a time, Yoshinobu Yamamoto. There were questions about who would take on the closer role through the second half of the season, and a constantly changing shortstop situation threatened to break the fabric and foundation of a less-unfused group of players.
However, the Dodgers remained steadfast in their practice of the fusion dance until it became so solidified that unsung and unlikely heroes like NLCS MVP Tommy Edman started to emerge as superstars among the group.
They have shown unprecedented confidence and are ready and willing to conquer any foe. Perhaps someday, the Los Angeles Dodgers will meet their match and face a team that has walked its journey toward creating a group of fused power and superiority. Until that day, the 2024 Los Angeles Dodgers will continue their fusion dance in unity, superiority, and ultimate triumph.
