LOS ANGELES -- Trey Yesavage has shifted the momentum in the 2025 World Series massively in favor of the Blue Jays, with his brilliant 12-strikeout performance in Wednesday’s 6-1 Game 5 victory bringing them just one win away from a championship.
Meanwhile, the Dodgers are on the ropes, heading back to Toronto down 3-2 in the Series. Before Game 6 on Friday, here are three takeaways from Dodger Stadium:
Blue Jays have made LA's rotation look mortal; now for their biggest challenge
Three pitches into Game 5, the Blue Jays had a 2-0 lead. Davis Schneider led off with a first-pitch homer off Blake Snell, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. followed suit two pitches later -- the first back-to-back homers to ever start a World Series game.
“That was the approach going in,” Blue Jays manager John Schneider said. “To be ready to hit.”
It was the latest example of the Toronto offense making a high-level starting pitcher look human. They’ve done it to Snell, who allowed five runs over 6 2/3 innings on Wednesday. They’ve done it to Shohei Ohtani, Tyler Glasnow, Max Fried, Carlos Rodón and the entire (very good) Mariners rotation.
“Needless to say, they're a great lineup,” Yoshinobu Yamamoto, the Dodgers’ Game 6 starter, said through interpreter Yoshihiro Sonoda. “I'm just going to get myself ready as best as possible.”
Of course, Yamamoto has been the best starter of the entire postseason -- coming off a pair of complete games, including a gem in Game 2 at Rogers Centre.
If the Blue Jays can solve Yamamoto -- or at least make him work and chase him early -- they might be rewarded with their first World Series title in 32 years. As we’ve seen, however, that’s so much easier said than done.
Yesavage has that DOG in him
It was fair to feel a little bit of angst about Yesavage taking the mound for the Blue Jays in Game 5. He went just four innings in a shaky Game 1 start, and that one came in the comforts of Rogers Centre. This time around, he was walking into the hostile territory of Dodger Stadium.
But unlike that Game 1 outing, where Yesavage practically abandoned his usually nasty splitter, the right-hander had everything working on Wednesday. His lethal slider-splitter combo resulted in 12 strikeouts and 23 whiffs. It was the most strikeouts for a rookie pitcher in a World Series game and the most for any pitcher without allowing a walk.
“Historic stuff, when you talk about that stage and his numbers,” John Schneider said. “Slider and split were electric.”
A few hours later, after he’d completed one of the most impressive starts by a young pitcher in World Series history, the 22-year-old Yesavage was already looking forward.
“Mentally, I'll be prepared for Game 6,” he said. “But I mean, I'm just ready for whatever's next. If there is a next.”
Time to find out what Dodgers are made of
For the first time this postseason, the Dodgers’ backs are against the wall. They’re facing elimination on Friday in Toronto -- and they do so with a lifeless offense that has scored just three runs in 18 innings over the last two games. (Not to mention, only one run across nine extra innings in Game 3.)
With Yamamoto for Game 6 and potentially Glasnow with a dose of Ohtani in Game 7, the Dodgers, on paper, have the pitching advantage. That might not matter if their offense doesn’t wake up.
“We’ve just got to come in fresh,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “We've been in elimination games, a core group of these guys. We got to find a way to win a game. That's it.”
Two games, technically. But Roberts is right: They’ve done it before.
The defining moment of the Dodgers’ World Series run last year came when they trailed the Padres, two games to one, in the NL Division Series. They responded with an emphatic Game 4 victory in a hostile environment in San Diego, before winning Game 5 in Los Angeles.
Does this team have a similar response in it? If so, the Dodgers will have to do it on the road twice this time.