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In the eyes of a lifelong Dodgers fan and third-generation Mexican American, the most memorable highlight of the World Series did not happen during the tense finale last Saturday, when her team executed multiple dramatic comeback act after another before winning in extra innings over the opposing team.

It happened in the previous game, when two second-tier athletes, Kike Hernández and the Venezuelan infielder, executed a thrilling, decisive play that simultaneously challenged many harmful misconceptions touted about Latinos in the past years.

The play in itself was breathtaking: Hernández charged in from the outfield to snag a ball he at first lost in the bright lights, then fired it to the infield to secure another, decisive out. Rojas, positioned nearby, caught the ball moments before a runner barreled into him, sending him to the ground.

This was not just a great sporting achievement, possibly the decisive turn in momentum in the team's favor after looking for most of the games like the underdog side. To her, it was thrilling, on multiple levels, a much-required uplift for the community and for the city after a period of enforcement actions, security forces monitoring the neighborhoods, and a steady drumbeat of negativity from national leaders.

"Kike and Miggy presented this counter-narrative," said Molina. "The world saw Latinos showing an infectious pride and joy in what they do, acting as leaders on the team, exhibiting a different kind of confidence. They are energetic, they're cheering, they're taking off their shirts."

"This represented such a juxtaposition with what we see on the news – enforcement actions, Latinos detained and pursued. It is so simple to be disheartened these days."

Not that it's exactly simple to be a team supporter nowadays – for Molina or for the many of other fans who attend regularly to matches and fill up as many as half of the stadium's 50,000 seats each time.

A Complicated Connection with the Organization

After aggressive immigration raids began in the city in June, and national guard troops were sent into the area to respond to resulting demonstrations, two of the city's sports teams quickly issued statements of support with affected communities – but not the baseball team.

The team president stated the Dodgers want to stay away of politics – a stance colored, perhaps, by the reality that a significant portion of the fans, even some Hispanic fans, are supporters of certain leaders. Under considerable external demands, the organization later pledged $one million in aid for families directly affected by the raids but issued no official criticism of the government.

White House Visit and Past Heritage

Three months earlier, the organization did not delay in accepting an invitation to mark their previous World Series victory at the official residence – a decision that sports columnists described as "pathetic … spineless … and contradictory", given the Dodgers' pride in having been the first professional franchise to break the color barrier in the 1940s and the frequent references of that legacy and the principles it embodies by officials and current and past athletes. Several players such as the coach had expressed reluctance to go to the White House during the first term but either changed their minds or gave in to pressure from the organization.

Business Control and Supporter Conflicts

A further complication for supporters is that the team are owned by a large investment group, Guggenheim Partners, whose equity holdings, according to sources and its own released balance sheets, involve a stake in a detention company that operates detention facilities. Guggenheim's executives has said repeatedly that it wants to stay out of political matters, but its critics say the inaction – and the financial stake – are their own form of compliance to current policies.

All of that contribute to significant mixed feelings among Latino supporters in particular – sentiments that surfaced even in the euphoria of this year's hard-won championship victory and the ensuing explosion of Dodgers pride across Los Angeles.

"Is it okay to root for the team?" local writer one observer reflected at the start of the postseason in an elegant article ruminating on "team loyalty in our blood, but uncertainty in our hearts". Galindo couldn't finally bring himself to view the World Series, but he still cared deeply, to the extent that he decided his personal boycott must have brought the squad the luck it required to succeed.

Separating the Players from the Owners

Many supporters who share similar misgivings seem to have decided that they can keep to back the players and its lineup of international stars, including the Japanese superstar Shohei Ohtani, while expressing disdain on the team's corporate leadership. Nowhere was this more clear than at the championship parade at Dodger Stadium on the following day, when the capacity crowd cheered in approval of the manager and his players but jeered the team president and the chief executive of the investors.

"These men in formal attire do not get to take our boys in blue from us," the fan said. "We've been with the team for more time than they have."

Historical Background and Community Impact

The issue, though, runs deeper than only the organization's present proprietors. The deal that moved the former franchise to the city in the late 1950s required the city demolishing three working-class Latino communities on a elevated area overlooking downtown and then transferring the land to the organization for a fraction of its actual worth. A track on a 2005 record that chronicles the events has an low-income worker at the stadium stating that the home he lost to removal is now a part of the field.

A prominent commentator, possibly southern California most influential Mexican American columnist and media personality, sees a darker side to the lengthy, problematic dynamic between the franchise and its audience. He calls the team the Flamin' Hot Cheetos of baseball, "a corporate entity with an undue, even unhealthy following by numerous Latinos" that has been shortchanging its supporters for decades.

"They have put one arm around Hispanic fans while profiting from them with the other for so long because they have been able to get away with it," Arellano wrote over the summer, when calls to avoid the team over its absence of reaction to the enforcement actions were upended by the uncomfortable fact that turnout at matches remained steady, even at the peak of the demonstrations when the city center was under to a evening curfew.

International Players and Community Bonds

Distinguishing the squad from its business leadership is not a simple matter, {