It’s good for baseball that the powerful but sloppy Yankees lost the World Series.

They might’ve dropped the trophy, anyway — but it was better for the sport that the Yankees fell off the way they did Wednesday night in the Bronx.

“See, boys and girls,” youth coaches can say today throughout the baseball world, “you have to pay attention and get the details right. Or you’ll end up like the Yankees. You don’t want that to happen, do you?”

If one of the worst defensive innings in World Series had gone unpunished or been surmounted by Yankees home runs — a distinct possibility — it would’ve further encouraged the home run-centric sport’s powers to skimp on defense and baserunning.

Dealt a 7-6 Series-clinching defeat, the Yankees were deprived of a victory that would’ve returned the series to Los Angeles for Game 6 and revived the face-of-baseball clubs pursuit of a 28th trophy.

Merely decent defense is all it would’ve taken for the Yankees to win the game.

Gerrit Cole, their ace, began with four hitless innings and took a 5-0 lead into the fifth inning. Having thrown only 49 pitches, he looked strong enough to finish the game.

But as the inning unfolded, the Yankees couldn’t have spelled defense if Vanna White had personally delivered them the final six letters.

Center fielder Aaron Judge muffed a lazy fly ball by not looking the ball into his glove. When Judge glanced at a runner between first base and second base, the chest-high ball glanced off his glove.

Shortstop Anthony Volpe then slung a 40-foot one-hopper toward third-baseman Jazz Chisolm Jr. in an attempt to get a force out. Chisolm tried to backhand the ball only for it to bounce off the glove’s heel.

Cole made it a pinstriped trifecta later in the inning.

The pitcher induced a slow grounder to first base, then assumed teammate Anthony Rizzo would beat Mookie Betts to the bag.

Cole forgot the rule: don’t assume, run to the bag. Rizzo, it turned out, didn’t have time to outrun Betts. Rizzo began his underhanded toss. Uh-oh. Cole wasnt there. He was some 30 feet way, jabbing his index finger in dismay.

The Yankees reclaimed the lead with Judge contributing a walk. But another defensive miscue — catcher’s interference by Austin Wells — contributed to the Dodgers going ahead for good.

So, thank you, Yankees.

Making critical defensive mistakes in Game 1 and two stupefying baserunning errors in other games, you helped bring baseball back to its core. There’s more to it than home runs, even though a record 61.2% of World Series runs came via the longball. Not even the Bronx Bombers could slug their way out of their miscues.

Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani celebrates in the locker room after their win against the New York Yankees in Game 5 to win the baseball World Series, Thursday, Oct. 31, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Ashley Landis)

Deserving winners

Let there be no doubt: the Dodgers earned the trophy.

They won across the board. Other than in Game 4, they were the better team in the field and on the basepaths. Their offense staked them to a quick lead in four of the five games. In a surprise, their trio of starting pitchers matched or edged out a Yankees quartet. In closing out the ninth inning Wednesday, Game 3 starter Walker Buehler joined the likes of Walter Johnson, Randy Johnson, Madison Bumgarner and Chris Sale to excel as both a starter and a closer in a World Series.

The Dodgers did all of this with Shohei Ohtani, their regular-season MVP, enfeebled as a hitter by the shoulder injury he suffered in Game 2.

Freddie Freeman entered himself into the conversation of “best World Series by one player.”

Along with hitting the first walk-off grand slam in the event’s history, he hit three other home runs plus a two-run single off a nasty Cole fastball in the five-run fifth inning Wednesday.

With 12 RBIs, Freeman tied the World Series record shared by Bobby Richardson and Mickey Mantle.

This year, the Dodgers lost more starting pitching to injury than perhaps any team in decades. They overcame major setbacks to Betts and Freeman, the latter hobbled by a mishap at first base involving the Padres Luis Arraez in the regular seasons second-to-last series.

Padres fans will remember L.A.’s postseason for what might have been. Twice in the Divisional Series, the Padres had a chance to eliminate the Dodgers only for L.A. to win by scores of 2-0 and 8-0. From there, the Dodgers knocked out the Mets and Yankees.

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts celebrates their win against the New York Yankees in Game 5 to win the baseball World Series, Thursday, Oct. 31, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Ashley Landis)

What DR ordered

The managerial performance by Dave Roberts stood out, too.

Stylistically, Roberts broke tendency. Throughout the postseason, he made repeated analogies to boxing and other forms of hand-to-hand combat. He wanted his team to adopt more of scrapper’s mentality, befitting the postseason.

“We’ve always been talented,” he said, per Fox Sports. “We haven’t always been tough. This team learned how to brawl. This team learned how to street fight.”

A great unknown is whether Roberts would’ve been fired if the Padres had eliminated his club, dealing L.A. its third consecutive exit in the Divisional Round. He said before the LCS he feared that a loss to the Padres would’ve cost him his job.

Instead, the cancer survivor, former Padres player and coach, and former quarterback of the unbeaten Rancho Buena Vista High School smashmouth Longhorns became the first manager since Tommy Lasorda in 1988 to lead the Dodgers to the World Series title after a 162-game season.

“I hope everyone gives Doc his flowers,” Freeman told ESPN.