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LOS ANGELES — When last we saw MLB’s two most marquee, mega-market teams match up, a talented but depleted Dodgers team authored a 4-1 World Series beatdown best recalled for L.A. ingenuity,

a hobbled Freddie Freeman’s home run heroics and, of course, all those Yankee faux pas predicted in a famed and prescient, pre-Series Dodgers scouting report.  Now, seven months later, the

Yankees, having shored up defensive deficiencies, rode another hot streak into baseball’s most beautiful venue. And the champion Dodgers entered even more talented (on paper) but much more

depleted and a lot less self-assured for the rematch.  Looking recently at the upcoming schedule facing his Dodgers, aptly nicknamed Dodgers manager Dave “Doc” Roberts, who seems to run an

infirmary as much as the sport’s starriest clubhouse, admitted they need to lower near-term expectations. They felt a lot better facing the two New York teams last October than they did

starting Friday for this week’s New York-New York week here.  “I’m just thinking about holding serve,” Roberts told The Post a few days before the Yankees and Mets were due to visit. “With

the teams we play, if we can just hold serve, come July and beyond, when we get to full health, we can take off from there.”