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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 didn't happen during the nail-biting final game last Saturday, when her team pulled off multiple death-defying escape act after another and then winning in extra innings over the Toronto Blue Jays.

It came in the previous game, when two second-tier players, Kike Hernández and Miguel Rojas, pulled off a thrilling, decisive sequence that simultaneously challenged many harmful misconceptions promoted about Hispanic people in the past decades.

The play itself was stunning: the outfielder raced in from the outfield to snag a ball he at first lost in the stadium lights, then fired it to the infield to record another, game-winning out. Rojas, positioned nearby, caught the ball just a split second before a runner barreled into him, knocking him to the ground.

This was not just a remarkable sporting achievement, perhaps the decisive turn in momentum in the team's favor after appearing for most of the games like the underdog team. For Molina, it was exhilarating, politically and culturally, a much-required morale boost for Latinos and for the city after a period of immigration raids, troops patrolling the streets, and a constant drumbeat of criticism from national leaders.

"The players put forth this alternative story," said the professor. "Everyone saw Latinos displaying an contagious enthusiasm in what they do, being leaders on the team, having a distinct kind of confidence. They are energetic, they're cheering, they're taking off their shirts."

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

Not that it's entirely straightforward to be a Dodgers fan these days – for Molina or for the many of other fans who attend faithfully to matches and fill up as many as half of the stadium's fifty thousand seats each time.

A Complicated Relationship with the Organization

When aggressive immigration raids started in the city in early June, and military troops were deployed into the city to react to resulting demonstrations, two of the local sports teams quickly released statements of solidarity with affected communities – but not the baseball team.

Management stated the organization want to steer clear of politics – a stance colored, perhaps, by the fact that a sizable minority of the fans, even Latinos, are supporters of certain leaders. After significant public pressure, the team later committed $1m in support for families directly impacted by the operations but made no public criticism of the government.

White House Event and Past Heritage

Months earlier, the team did not hesitate in agreeing to an offer to mark their previous World Series win at the White House – a move that sports columnists labeled as "disappointing … spineless … and contradictory", given the team's pride in having been the first professional team to end the racial segregation in the 1940s and the regular invocations of that history and the principles it embodies by executives and current and former players. A number of players including the coach had voiced reluctance to travel to the White House during the initial period but either changed their minds or succumbed to pressure from team management.

Business Control and Fan Conflicts

A further issue for supporters is that the Dodgers are controlled by a corporate behemoth, Guggenheim Partners, whose equity holdings, as per sources and its own released balance sheets, include a stake in a detention corporation that operates detention centers. Guggenheim's executives has stated repeatedly that it aims to remain neutral of politics, but its detractors say the silence – and the financial stake – are their own type of acquiescence to certain policies.

All of that add up to considerable mixed feelings among Hispanic fans in particular – sentiments that emerged even in the excitement of this year's hard-won World Series triumph and the following explosion of Dodgers pride across Los Angeles.

"Is it okay to root for the team?" area columnist Erick Galindo reflected at the start of the postseason in an elegant article ruminating on "team loyalty in our blood, but doubt in our hearts". He was unable to finally bring himself to watch the World Series, but he still felt strongly, to the point that he believed his personal protest must have brought the team the luck it required to win.

Distinguishing the Players from the Owners

Numerous supporters who share similar misgivings seem to have decided that they can keep to back the team and its lineup of global players, including the Japanese superstar a key player, while pouring scorn on the organization's business 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 approval of the coach and his players but jeered the executive and the top official of the ownership group.

"The executives in suits do not get to take our players from us," Molina said. "We've been with the team for more time than they have."

Past Background and Neighborhood Impact

The problem, however, runs deeper than only the organization's present owners. The deal that brought the former franchise to Los Angeles in the 1950s involved the municipality demolishing three working-class Hispanic communities on a hill overlooking downtown and then transferring the land to the team for a small part of its market value. A track on a 2005 album that chronicles the events has an low-income worker at the stadium revealing that the home he forfeited to eviction is now third base.

Gustavo Arellano, perhaps the region's most influential Latino writer and broadcaster, sees a darker side to the lengthy, dysfunctional relationship between the franchise and its audience. He calls the team the Flamin' Hot Cheetos of baseball, "a business organization with an excessive, even unhealthy devotion by numerous Latinos" that has been exploiting its supporters for decades.

"They've put one arm around Latino fans while profiting from them with the other for so long because they have been able to avoid consequences," Arellano wrote over the warmer months, when calls to boycott the organization over its absence of response to the raids were contradicted by the awkward fact that attendance at matches remained steady, even at the height of the protests when downtown LA was under to a nightly curfew.

Global Players and Fan Bonds

Separating the team from its business leadership is not a easy matter, {