The Toronto Blue Jays and Los Angeles Dodgers split the first two games of the 2025 World Series at Rogers Centre. Now the series shifts back to U.S. soil and Chavez Ravine, with three games lined up at Dodger Stadium. In theory, the Dodgers can close it out at home, but this has the feeling of a long and competitive series.
Both teams impressed in their own distinct ways through the first two games. The Blue Jays' offense patiently chipped away at Blake Snell in Game 1 and exploded once the Dodgers bullpen was called into action. In Game 2, Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched his second complete game of the postseason, putting himself in pole position for World Series MVP honors if Los Angeles gets the job done.
That is the blueprint for both teams. Toronto needs to get to the Dodgers bullpen early and let its uber-talented lineup reach its boiling point. If the Dodgers' elite gauntlet of starting pitchers can provide length and give the offense time to build up a cushion on the scoreboard, Toronto will fold.
These are quite possibly the two best teams in MLB this season. "Duh," it's the World Series, but how often are the two absolute best teams really represented on this stage? Toronto proved its mettle all season long with an incredible blend of plate discipline and slugging. The Dodgers are the Dodgers, with a cap sheet in the one-percent tax bracket. It's a fun clash of team-building mantras and on-field styles. And yet, with elite strengths still come potentially season-ending weaknesses. No team is perfect and the margin for error is zero on the World Series stage.
Here is how both teams need to step up in Game 3 and beyond.
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Blue Jays need more from the starting rotation
Toronto's offense will be fine. The Dodgers rotation is damn near bulletproof, but Yamamoto is the absolute pinnacle of that group. The Blue Jays typically chip, chip and chip away some more, with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. still in the midst of the greatest individual postseason run in recent memory. The Blue Jays won't score nine runs in an inning very often, but they will find ways to put runs on the board.
Where Toronto needs to make up ground is on the pitching front, primarily in the starting rotation. Neither team has a great bullpen, but the Jays have a clear edge there. Not so much with the starters.
Trey Yesavage only gave Toronto four turbulent innings of work in Game 1. Kevin Guasman pressed into the seventh inning on Saturday, to his credit, but Los Angeles' lineup eventually caught up to him, with Will Smith and Max Muncy both cranking homers.
That is arguably option 1A and 1B for this Blue Jays rotation. Yesavage has wielded the benefit of inexperience all postseason. These teams just aren't used to him. But his typically elite splitter was lifeless on short rest in Game 1. He was able to limit the damage to two earned runs with a few clutch pitches, but Yesavage will probably appear on abbreviated rest again in Game 5. If he can't settle into his mechanics and command those off-speed pitches, the Dodgers aren't going to strand that many runners again. He put seven Dodgers on base in four innings. That's not a sustainable recipe for success.
Max Scherzer and Shane Bieber are next on deck for Toronto. Both had their moments in the ALCS, but Scherzer finished the regular season in a rut. Bieber only made seven starts before the playoffs due to injury. Neither can match the peaks of Yesavage or Guasman at full strength, but the Blue Jays will need them to execute and pitch deep into games. The Dodgers are in the unique position of needing seven or eight innings from their starters each and every night. Toronto has a bit more flexibility, but if this series comes down to Mason Fluharty and Chris Bassitt pitching high-leverage spots on a regular basis, Los Angeles has the upper hand.
Dodgers could use a bit more from their superstars
Will Smith came up big in L.A.'s Game 2 victory, going 2-for-4 with a home run and 3 RBI. He kicked off the scoring in the first inning and helped put Gausman on ice in the seventh. Add in the solo blast from Max Muncy and an extra RBI knock from Andy Pages, and the Dodgers were able to scrounge together enough offense to support Yamamoto's historic dominance.
But what about the superstars? Los Angeles hasn't received much of anything from the bottom of the lineup in this series, which is the opposite of what we saw in the NLDS and NLCS. Meanwhile, the top of the lineup is equally cold. Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman are the foundation of this Los Angeles offense. Their power has carried the Dodgers to countless victories over the past two years.
Through the first two games, L.A.'s three-headed monster is a combined 4-for-21 with two RBI, which Ohtani supplied with a garbage time home run in Game 1 to cut the Blue Jays lead to seven.
Los Angeles has become unexpectedly dependent on its starting rotation. The bullpen is an open wound and there's no point in pretending like there's a solution, especially with Alex Vesia unavailable. But so often this season, the Dodgers were able to push through inconsistency on the mound due to a titanic offense. Right now, L.A. practically lives and dies with its starting pitchers.
Tyler Glasnow and Shohei Ohtani are on deck to start on the mound in Games 3 and 4 after solid outings from Snell and, obviously, Yamamoto. Both Glasnow and Ohtani are throwing gas this October, but neither will give the Dodgers nine innings of machine-esque dominance like Yamamoto just did. The Dodgers need to out-slug the Blue Jays more emphatically, and it starts with their stars showing up in big spots.
Los Angeles has a ton of depth offensively. Will Smith, Max Muncy and Teoscar Hernández can all pop off at any given moment. But typically, their most trustworthy sources of offense are Ohtani, Betts and Freeman, particularly on the postseason stage. Ohtani just doesn't look quite like himself this October, with the exception of that three-HR, put-away performance against Milwaukee in the NLCS. Betts and Freeman are two of the great World Series performers of this generation, so the switch can flip. It's just of question of will it?
If not, that Blue Jays offense will get hot sooner than later, and L.A. might not have the necessary juice to keep up.