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In the eyes of Natalia Molina and longtime Mexican American, the crowning moment of the World Series did not happen during the tense finale on Saturday, when her squad pulled off multiple dramatic comeback act after another before prevailing in overtime against the Toronto Blue Jays.

It happened a game earlier, when two second-tier athletes, Kike Hernández and the Venezuelan infielder, pulled off a electrifying, decisive play that simultaneously challenged many negative misconceptions touted about Latinos in recent decades.

The moment itself was breathtaking: Hernández charged in from the outfield to snag a ball he at first lost in the bright lights, then threw it to second base to record another, game-winning play. Rojas, at second base, caught the ball just a split second before a runner barreled into him, knocking him to the ground.

This was not just a great sporting achievement, possibly the key turn in momentum in the Dodgers' favor after looking for much of the games like the underdog side. To her, it was exhilarating, politically and culturally, a much-required morale boost for the community and for Los Angeles after months of immigration raids, troops patrolling the streets, and a constant drumbeat of criticism from official sources.

"The players put forth this alternative story," said Molina. "Everyone witnessed Latinos displaying an infectious pride and joy in what they do, being leaders on the team, exhibiting a distinct kind of confidence. They are bombastic, they're cheering, they're removing their shirts."

"This represented such a juxtaposition with what we observe on the news – raids, Latinos thrown to the ground and chased down. It's so simple to be disheartened these days."

Not that it's exactly straightforward to be a team supporter nowadays – for her or for the legions of other fans who attend faithfully to home games and fill up as many as half of the stadium's 50,000 seats each time.

A Complicated Relationship with the Organization

After intensified immigration raids started in the city in June, and military units were deployed into the area to react to resulting demonstrations, two of the local sports clubs quickly released messages of solidarity with affected communities – but not the Dodgers.

The team president has said the Dodgers want to steer clear of politics – a stance colored, perhaps, by the reality that a sizable minority of the supporters, even some Hispanic fans, are followers of certain leaders. After significant external demands, the team subsequently pledged $one million in support for families personally affected by the operations but issued no official condemnation of the government.

Official Event and Historical Heritage

Three months before, the organization did not delay in accepting an invitation to mark their previous World Series win at the White House – a move that sports writers labeled as "pathetic … weak … and hypocritical", considering the Dodgers' boast in having been the first major league franchise to end the racial segregation in the mid-20th century and the regular invocations of that legacy and the principles it embodies by executives and current and past players. A number of players including the manager had expressed unwillingness to go to the White House during the first term but then reconsidered or succumbed to pressure from the organization.

Business Control and Fan Conflicts

An additional issue for fans is that the team are owned by a corporate behemoth, the ownership group, whose investments, as per sources and its own published balance sheets, involve a share in a detention company that runs enforcement facilities. Guggenheim's leadership has stated repeatedly that it aims to remain neutral of political matters, but its critics say the inaction – and the investment – are their own type of acquiescence to current policies.

These factors add up to significant conflicted emotions among Latino fans in especial – sentiments that emerged even in the euphoria of this season's hard-fought World Series victory and the ensuing explosion of Dodgers support across the city.

"Is it okay to root for the Dodgers?" local writer one observer agonized at the start of the playoffs in an thoughtful essay ruminating on "team loyalty in our blood, but uncertainty in our hearts". Galindo was unable to ultimately bring himself to view the World Series, but he still cared strongly, to the point that he believed his personal protest must have brought the team the fortune it needed to succeed.

Distinguishing the Players from the Management

Many supporters who have similar reservations appear to have decided that they can keep to back the team and its lineup of global stars, featuring the Japanese superstar a key player, while pouring scorn on the organization's corporate overlords. Nowhere was this more evident than at the victory celebration at the home venue on the following day, when the capacity crowd roared in support of the coach and his players but jeered the executive and the chief executive of the ownership group.

"These men in formal attire don't get to claim our players from us," the fan said. "We've been with the team longer than they have."

Past Background and Neighborhood Effect

The issue, though, goes further than just the organization's current proprietors. The agreement that brought the former franchise to Los Angeles in the 1950s involved the municipality demolishing three working-class Hispanic neighborhoods on a elevated area above downtown and then transferring the property to the organization for a small part of its market value. A track on a mid-2000s album that chronicles the events has an impoverished worker at the stadium stating that the house he lost to removal is now third base.

A prominent commentator, perhaps southern California most widely followed Latino columnist and media personality, sees a darker side to the lengthy, dysfunctional dynamic between the franchise and its fanbase. He calls the team the Flamin' Hot Cheetos of baseball, "a business organization with an excessive, even unhealthy following by numerous Latinos" that has been shortchanging its fans for decades.

"They've acted around Hispanic fans while profiting from them with the other hand for so long because they have been able to avoid consequences," the writer wrote over the summer, when demands to boycott the team over its absence of reaction to the raids were upended by the awkward fact that turnout at home games did not dip, even at the peak of the demonstrations when downtown LA was subject to a evening restriction.

Global Players and Community Connections

Separating the team from its corporate owners is not a simple matter, {