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In the eyes of a lifelong Dodgers fan and longtime Mexican American, the most memorable moment of the World Series did not happen during the nail-biting finale on Saturday, when her squad pulled off multiple death-defying escape act after another and then winning in extra innings against the opposing team.

It happened in the previous game, when two supporting athletes, the Puerto Rican player and Miguel Rojas, pulled off a electrifying, decisive sequence that at the same time upended many negative misconceptions promoted about Hispanic people in recent decades.

The moment in itself was stunning: the outfielder charged in from left field to snag a ball he at first misjudged in the stadium lights, then threw it to second base to record another, game-winning play. Rojas, at second base, received the ball moments before a runner barreled into him, sending him to the ground.

This was not just a great sporting achievement, perhaps the key turn in the series in the team's favor after looking for most of the games like the underdog side. To her, it was exhilarating, politically and culturally, a much-required morale boost for Latinos and for the city after a period of enforcement actions, troops monitoring the streets, and a constant stream of criticism from national leaders.

"Kike and Miggy presented this alternative story," explained Molina. "The world witnessed Latinos showing an contagious enthusiasm in what they do, acting as leaders on the team, having a distinct kind of confidence. They are bombastic, they're cheering, they're taking off their shirts."

"It was such a contrast with what we see on the news – enforcement actions, Latinos thrown to the ground and pursued. It's so easy to be disheartened these days."

However, it's exactly simple to be a Dodgers supporter these days – for her or for the many of other fans who attend regularly to matches and occupy as many as 50% of the venue's fifty thousand spots each time.

The Mixed Connection with the Organization

When intensified enforcement operations began in Los Angeles in June, and military troops were sent into the area to react to ensuing protests, two of the city's soccer teams quickly released messages of solidarity with immigrant families – while the Dodgers.

The team president stated the Dodgers prefer to steer clear of political issues – a view influenced, possibly, by the fact that a significant portion of the fans, even some Hispanic fans, are followers of certain political figures. After significant external demands, the team later pledged $one million in support for families personally impacted by the raids but made no public criticism of the administration.

Official Visit and Historical Heritage

Three months earlier, the team did not hesitate in agreeing to an offer to celebrate their previous championship win at the official residence – a decision that sports columnists described as "disappointing … weak … and contradictory", considering the team's pride in having been the first professional franchise to break the racial segregation in the 1940s and the frequent invocations of that history and the principles it embodies by executives and current and former athletes. Several players such as the coach had expressed unwillingness to go to the event during the first term but then reconsidered or gave in to demands from the organization.

Corporate Control and Supporter Dilemmas

An additional issue for supporters is that the team are controlled by a large investment group, the ownership group, whose investments, according to sources and its own published balance sheets, involve a share in a detention company that operates detention facilities. The group's leadership has stated many times that it wants to stay out of political matters, but its critics say the silence – and the financial stake – are their own form of compliance to current agendas.

All of that add up to significant mixed feelings among Latino fans in particular – feelings that emerged even in the euphoria of this season's hard-won World Series victory and the following outpouring of Dodgers pride across Los Angeles.

"Can one to root for the team?" area columnist Erick Galindo agonized at the beginning of the playoffs in an thoughtful article pondering on "Dodger blue in our veins, but doubt in our hearts". He couldn't finally bring himself to watch the World Series, but he still felt deeply, to the extent that he decided his one-man boycott must have given the squad the luck it needed to win.

Distinguishing the Players from the Owners

Many supporters who share Galindo's misgivings appear to have decided that they can continue to back the players and its lineup of global stars, including the Japanese superstar a key player, while pouring scorn on the organization's business overlords. Nowhere was this more clear than at the victory celebration at Dodger Stadium on the following day, when the packed audience roared in approval of the manager and his athletes but booed the team president and the chief executive of the investors.

"The executives in suits do not get to claim our players from us," the fan said. "We have been with the Dodgers for more time than they have."

Past Background and Neighborhood Impact

The problem, though, goes further than only the team's present proprietors. The deal that moved the former franchise to the city in the 1950s involved the city demolishing three working-class Hispanic communities on a hill above downtown and then selling the land to the organization for a fraction of its market value. A song on a 2005 album that documents the events has an low-income worker at the stadium stating that the home he forfeited to eviction is now a part of the field.

A prominent commentator, perhaps southern California most influential Mexican American writer and media personality, sees a darker side to the lengthy, dysfunctional relationship between the franchise and its fanbase. He calls the team the Flamin' Hot Cheetos of baseball, "a corporate entity with an undue, even harmful devotion by too many Latinos" that has been shortchanging its supporters for decades.

"They have acted around Latino followers while picking their pockets with the other hand for so long because they have been able to get away with it," the writer noted over the summer, when calls to avoid the organization over its absence of reaction to the raids were upended by the uncomfortable fact that turnout at home games remained steady, even at the height of the protests when the city center was under to a evening curfew.

Global Players and Fan Connections

Distinguishing the team from its corporate owners is not a easy task, {