TORONTO — Some kind of statement, eh?
For all the talk leading into the World Series about the Dodgers being on the verge of going back-to-back, strengthening their case for a dynasty and relying on their dominant rotation, the Blue Jays brought it to a screeching halt, at least for one glorious night north of the border.
Game 1 entered the bottom of the sixth inning tied up and finished it a blowout, the Blue Jays doing to three Dodgers pitchers what they had done to many Yankees and Mariners before them on the road to the Fall Classic.
First against Blake Snell and then two relievers, the relentless Blue Jays lineup sent 12 men to the plate and scored nine of them, nearly blowing the roof off Rogers Centre in the process on the way to a 11-4 win over the Dodgers.
Addison Barger delivered the punishing blow, crushing the first pinch-hit grand slam in World Series history, a left-on-left blast off Anthony Banda that cracked open the game with a 9-2 lead.
In the first World Series game here in 32 years, the Blue Jays put on a show in front of a sellout crowd, proving that they were not just going to let the Dodgers skate to a second straight title.
Across the month of October — and really, for much of the regular season — the Blue Jays have cared little about the pedigree, salary or name of the starting pitcher on the mound against them. They have frustrated and flummoxed them all the same with their contact-oriented approach, the one that struck out at the lowest rate of any team during the season.
Once the postseason began, they bludgeoned Max Fried and Carlos Rodón in the division series, then knocked around George Kirby, Luis Castillo and Logan Gilbert in the ALCS.
Snell came into Friday having thrown three gems in these playoffs, combining to give up just two runs on six hits and strike out 28 across 21 innings. But the Blue Jays would not become his latest victim, even after squandering some early chances, including leaving the bases loaded in the bottom of the first.
They tied the game 2-2 in the fourth inning as Daulton Varsho plugged back in the electricity in the building with a two-run blast — the first left-on-left home run Snell had given up this year — before exploding in the sixth.
It began innocently enough, when Bo Bichette — playing his first game since Sept. 6, when he sprained his left knee — drew a walk. But then Alejandro Kirk followed with a single through the right side and Varsho got drilled by a full-count fastball on Snell’s 100th and final pitch of the night.
Emmet Sheehan entered from the bullpen and poured gasoline on the fire against the bottom of the Blue Jays lineup. Ernie Clement, who singled the Yankees to death in the division series, roped a single up the middle for the 3-2 lead. Pinch-hitter Nathan Lukes, who nearly retired while spending eight years in the minor leagues before making his big league debut in 2023, fell behind 0-2 before drawing a nine-pitch walk that made it 4-2. Andrés Giménez, in the lineup mostly for his glove, followed with a single of his own that extended the lead to 5-2.
One out later, Banda came on to face Barger, the left-handed hitter that Blue Jays manager John Schneider had sent up as a pinch hitter. Barger sent the crowd of 44,353 into a frenzy with his grand slam that broke the game open.
Kirk followed with a two-run shot to cap off the offensive onslaught, making it 11-2 and punctuating a strong night for the catcher, who went 3-for-3 with a walk.
Shohei Ohtani — taunted with chants of “We don’t need you” in the ninth inning after leaving the Blue Jays at the altar in free agency two years ago — answered with a two-run homer in the seventh inning to pull the Dodgers within 11-4, but that was the extent of their response.
Trey Yesavage, the Blue Jays rookie who dominated the Yankees in Game 2 of the division series but looked more hittable in the ALCS, lasted just four innings.
But while he did not have his best command or his dominant splitter, he was able to limit the damage to two runs by not allowing things to escalate when it looked like they were about to, keeping his team in the game for it to come back with a vengeance by the end of the night.
