Tag: World Series final game

Final Score: Dodgers 5 Blue Jays 4 in 11 innings

Why The Dodgers Won: The Dodgers became the first team to win back-to-back World Series since the Yankees won 3 in a row from 1998 to 2000. You have heard of bullpen games. This was a starting rotation game. The Dodgers used all of their 4 starting pitchers. Shohei Ohtani went 2 and 1/3 innings, Tyler Glasnow went 2 and 1/3 innings, and Blake Snell went 1 and 1/3 innings. Last but certainly not least, Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched 2 and 2/3 innings the day after he went 6 innings in game 6. He was the winning pitcher in 3 of the Dodgers’ 4 wins. The Dodgers used only 2 pitchers out of their bullpen, and one of those, Emmet Sheehan, made 12 starts during the regular season out of 15 appearances. It was a sad last 2 games for the vaunted Blue Jay offense. In the last 2 games of the World Series, they were 4 for 26 with runners in scoring position. They left 22 men on base, including 14 in game 7. It is going to be a very long offseason for the Blue Jays.

The Key Moments Of The Game: In the bottom of the third, with a runner on 3rd base and one out, the Dodgers decided to intentionally walk Vlad Guerrero. They paid the price when Bo Bichette took an Ohtani slider and hit it 442 feet into the seats, giving the Blue Jays a 3-0 lead. The Dodgers started chipping away with a run in the 4th and a run in the 6th. Mookie Betts opened the 6th inning with a walk and eventually scored on a sacrifice fly. Both Dodger runs scored on sacrifice flies. In the bottom of the 6th, the Blue Jays scored a run on a single and a double. Then the Dodgers long balled the Blue Jays to victory. Max Muncy in the 8th made it 4-3. In the top of the 9th, Miguel Rojas took a 3-2 slider and lined it over the fence to tie the game. Rojas, who is 36 years old, had hit only 7 home runs during the regular season. He did not start in the first 5 games of the series. He is at the end of a 3-year, 15 million dollar deal. He is a free agent in 2026. I wonder if anyone will sign him. He is one of the most unlikely World Series heroes of all time. Will Smith, who is 30 years old and has a 10-year, 140 million dollar contract, hit the go-ahead homer in the top of the 11th. It is just too painful to go through all the missed chances the Blue Jays had since the 6th inning of game 6. In the last 15 innings of the World Series, the Blue Jays had a runner on 2nd with no outs 4 times and a runner on third with less than 2 outs 3 times and did not score a run. They could not do what the Dodgers did 2 times in game 7: hit a sacrifice fly. If they could have just done it one out of 3 times, they would be the World Champions. On one final note, I think the bench-clearing incident, as ridiculous as it was, did not really have any bearing on the outcome of the game. It is a little ironic that the most fortunate play of the game for the Dodgers was the line drive by Andres Gimenez that Max Muncy snared, even though he was playing in for the bunt. Gimenez needlessly instigated the confrontation. Just like the Blue Jays, you could say it was not his night.

The 2025 baseball season has come to an end. Even though I did not think they would, I have to give the Dodgers credit for going full bore to try to win two World Series in a row. It took them 11 innings into Game 7, but they got the job done when it needed to be done. As mentioned before, this will be a long offseason for the Blue Jays. It is what I always say: hitting is always a sometime thing. In spring training 2026, I expect the Blue Jays to be practicing hitting fly balls deep enough to score a runner from third base. It was a great season for baseball. This was probably the best postseason baseball has had since the 1986 season. In the coming weeks, I will look at what the Pirates should do but probably won’t do in 2026. I think you will find it to be a bit of a surprise. Not as big of a surprise as the Pirates having a winning season, but surprising nonetheless.

Final Score: Dodgers 7 Yankees 6

Why The Dodgers Won: Thanks to the worst fielding inning in World Series history the Dodgers were able to come back from a 5-0 deficit to win the 2024 Fall Classic in 5 games. Instead of 2 out lightening, the Dodgers had 5 out lightening as the Yankees handed them 5 runs all unearned in the 5th inning. The go-ahead run was set up by catcher’s interference in the year of catcher’s interference. The Dodgers took the lead for good in the top of the 8th on 2 sacrifice flies. Dave Roberts’s gamble paid off by giving the A squad bullpen a rest on a bullpen game. He brought in his big starter Walker Buehler in the 9th to nail down the win. This move is far from unprecedented, but Roberts started Buehler warming up in the top of the 8th inning, giving him plenty of time to loosen up. I think he had no intention of bringing him in the bottom of the 8th. He stuck with Blake Treinen when the Yankees threatened in the 8th inning and Treinen came through getting out of the jam. Buehler came in the 9th and mowed the Yankees down to give the Dodgers the World Series win.

The Key Moments Of The Game: Gerrit Cole was breezing along through 4 innings giving up 2 walks and 0 hits. Then the nightmare began. Kiki Hernandez started the inning off with a single to right field for the first hit of the game. Tommy Edman hit a little humpback liner to centerfield that Aaron Judge just dropped when he took his eye off the ball to check the runner. The drop surprised Judge so much that there was just enough of a hesitation to pick up the ball, that Hernandez avoided being forced at 2nd base. Will Smith hit a ground ball to the hole at short, and Anthony Volpe made a terrible throw to third base that Jazz Chisholm could not short hop and everybody was safe to load the bases. Then Cole bore down and struck out the next two batters on 8 pitches. Mookie Betts hit a ground ball to 1st that took a little bit of a strange hop that moved Rizzo to his right just a touch. On a play that Cole thought Rizzo was going to take it himself and Rizzo thought Cole was covering the bag the Yankees failed to get an out. This was the 5th out that the Yankees failed to get. The Dodgers then struck with 5 out lightening when Freddie Freeman singled to drive in 2 runs. Teoscar Hernandez then doubled off the left centerfield wall to drive in the tying runs and the Dodgers were eyeballing the Yankees 5-5. This was an inning that was gift wrapped by the Yankees and the Dodgers said thank you very much, see you next year.

Next Game: None, the season is over. This was the redemption post season for Dave Roberts of the Dodgers. He may not get manager of the year this year, but he was the manager of the post season. Going into the playoffs the Dodger pitching was going to be their big weakness. Roberts managed the bullpen superbly, always keeping his eye on the main goal which is to win each series. He was especially brilliant in the World Series saving his bullpen in game 4 when the Dodgers had a 3-0 lead in games. On the other side of the coin Aaron Boone continues to prove that you cannot go from the broadcast booth to managing a baseball team no matter how much talent they have. I am not all that familiar with the Yankee bench, but it looks like Boone is not either. He only used two pinch hitters the entire series and that was to interchange catchers both times. He put a pitcher in the game in the bottom of the 10th in game 1 that had not pitched in over a month and never relieved this late in a game in his career. Result, grand slam home run, game over. After it was all said and done, the Dodgers won this World Series because they made baseball plays, and the Yankees did not. Hopefully the Yankees will really have a spring training next year.