A World Series to remember

Context

I’m not a serious baseball fan, I’ve been playing a lot of MLB The Show 25 over the past year. To be specific, I’m trying to guide my Road To The Show character, Benny Rodriguez, to personal and team glory. The inspiration is The Sandlot, the classic kids’ movie from my youth. Benny Rodriguez is the neighborhood leader who befriends the main character, Scotty Smalls. He sports an LA Dodgers hat throughout the movie.

The Dodgers of today are a legitimate powerhouse. Their highest-paid roster is full of stars, including megastar Shohei Ohtani. He is a modern Babe Ruth, whom the kids in The Sandlot revere. (The exception for most of the movie is Smalls, because he’s clueless about baseball.) The Dodgers are the champs of 2024, so people expected them to cruise through the World Series this year.

Their opponents were the Toronto Blue Jays. They won back-to-back World Series in 1992 and 1993, and they made it the ALCS in 2015 and 2106. The team hadn’t gone deep into the postseason again until this year. Despite their promising core, there were mentions last season of re-building everything. They had a hot-streak at the right time and won the AL East division by a tiebreaker over the New York Yankees.

The irony was that the Blue Jays had more regular season wins than the Dodgers. The difference was minimal (94 to 93), so in hindsight, it was a hint of their even matchup. Both teams had good batting, fielding, and pitching throughout their lineups. The consensus was that the Dodgers had much better pitching from their starters. Pitching from relievers and closers was a clear weakness for both teams, though.

LA and Toronto won their divisions in the regular season, but the Dodgers had to play in the Wild Card round. They swept their best-of-three Wild Card series. Then they won their best-of-five NLDS, losing once, and then swept the best-of-seven NCLS. The Blue Jays won their best-of-five ALDS (against the Yankees) also losing once. Their ALCS, against the Seattle Mariners, went to a full seven games.

The Series

Games 1-2

Game 1 was close until the sixth inning, when the Blue Jays scored 9 runs. Four of them came from a historic grand slam by Addison Barger. Like they did all season, Toronto had dynamic hitting from their balanced lineup. They stunned the reigning champs as they won 11-4. Game 2 played out as most people expected the entire series to play out, though. Dodgers ace Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched a complete game as LA evened the series with a 5-1 win.

Games 3-4

Game 3 was epic in the truest sense: it went to 18 innings, the equivalent of two full games. Freddie Freeman ended it with a solo home run to give the Dodgers a 6-5 win. I stayed up for the entire thing, although by that point, I was listening to the broadcast more than I was watching it. Game 4 was like Game 1; it was close until the Blue Jays scored a bunch runs (4) in a late inning (7th). They won 6-2 to even the series at 2-2.

Game 5

Game 5 had the same outcome and almost the same score, 6-1, but the game unfolded in a different way. The Blue Jays opened the game with back-to-back home runs. Their scoring was more distributed across the game with one- or two-run innings. Toronto’s rookie phenom Trey Yesavage was the winning pitcher. His ascension from A-level baseball to the World Series in one season would be perfect for Road To The Show.

It would’ve been perfect if his win had been the Blue Jays’ fourth, and title-clinching, win. Instead, it put them one win away. Toronto had home-field advantage because of their mentioned edge in regular-season wins. The 2-3-2 format of the World Series guaranteed that in would end on their figurative and literal turf. I sensed that the Dodgers were going to even the series and win it, though.

Game 6

Yamamoto stifled the Blue Jays in Game 6 like he did in Game 2. He got help from Roki Sasaki and Tyler Glasnow, both of whom would be starters otherwise. Mookie Betts, who had been struggling, hit an early two-run single that proved to be the difference. The game ended with a surprise double-play by Kiké Hernandez. He raced to catch a shallow pop-up to left field and then threw to second base to force out Addison Barger, who .

The defining play might be The Wedge. Barger got to second base at the end of the game because he hit a deep ball. It somehow landed into a wedged position between the outfield wall and the warning track. The Dodgers outfielders recognized the dead-ball situation right away. By not playing the ball, they prevented Barger from advancing beyond second base. He represented the tying run, but three pitches later, he was the final out instead.

Game 7

The scoring in Game 7 began when Bo Bichette hit an early three-run home run against Ohtani. He and Vladimir Guerrero Jr, whom Ohtani had walked ahead of him, had been the face of the Blue Jays for the past decade. Both developed within the organization, and both were sons of notable MLB players. Will Smith scored the next inning. Mookie Betts later scored in the sixth inning from a sacrifice fly to make the score 3-2.

Andrés Giménez hit an RBI double in the bottom of that inning to make the score 4-2. Ernie Clements, who had set the record for most hits in a post-season, touched home with an emphatic slide. Max Muncy hit a solo home run for the Dodgers in the top of the eight inning against Tre Yesavage, though. At that point, the late comeback that I had been imagining, all game-long, seemed like a real possibility.

Miguel Rojas hit a solo home run against Jeff Hoffman to tie the game when the Blue Jays were two outs away from glory. Instead, the Dodgers were the team that got two clutch outs in that inning. Yamamoto entered as a relief pitcher despite his full workload the prior night. He soon walked Alejandro Kirk to load the bases with one out. Almost any hit to the outfield in that situation would have won the game for the Blue Jays.

Rojas got the second out after he fielded a ground ball hit between first and second base. I reacted by expecting a throw to first base, but Rojas made the sensible throw to home. He had to gather himself from kneeled fielding position and somewhat rush his throw. Catcher Will Smith had to reach for it and, in turn, lifted his back foot from home plate. He recovered an instant before pinch-runner Isiah Kiner-Falefa slid into home plate.

Andy Pages had entered the game as defensive specialist for the Dodgers that inning. He got the final out when Ernie Clement hit a deep fly ball to left-field. Pages raced across from his center-field position and reached across his body. To make the catch, he bowled over Kiké Hernandez, who had been running to catch the ball over his shoulder. Pages’s range, concentration, and audacity made it impressive.

The 10th inning was a blur, although the Dodgers loaded the bases with one out. Like the Blue Jays in the prior inning, the visitors could not exploit the advantage. The decisive 11th inning had Will Smith hitting a two-out, solo home run against Shane Bieber. Guerrero hit a lead-off double in the bottom of the inning, but the Dodgers later got one out. Alejandro Kirk hit a ground ball to Mookie Betts, who completed a ‘6-3’ double play to end the game.

In hindsight, the extra innings were a bit anticlimactic. The subdued mood of the home crowd after the tying run definitely lowered the excitement. The Dodgers narrowed, tied, and won the game with late-game runs in separate innings. They were all solo home runs by different batters against different pitchers. That outcome would devastate me, but as a casual fan, the play by both teams, throughout the series, amazed me.

Conclusion

I’m not alone in my view that the 2025 World Series is the greatest in recent memory. My Road To The Show player in MLB The Show 25 has lost in the World Series, so I empathize with Blue Jays players and fans. I have to recognize my two lousy games to open my RTTS series. The Blue Jays have to recognize, for better or worse, that they’ve come so close. The Dodgers, by contrast, have to prepare for a potential three-peat.

I’ll be paying more attention to Major League baseball over the next year, for sure.