The Dodgers manager tried to spark his team’s offense Wednesday to no avail. Plus, Trey Yesavage rose to the occasion and a World Series MVP favorite emerged.
, spearheading a 6–1 victory that brought Toronto one win away from its first championship since 1993. He struck out 12 batters and gave up just one run on three hits over seven innings, breaking the record forHe outdueled Los Angeles ace Blake Snell, who gave up five runs on six hits and four walks in 6 2/3 innings.
The Blue Jays ambushed Snell, with Davis Schneider driving the game’s first pitch over the left field wall for a lead-off homer. Two pitches later, Vladimir Guerrero Jr.That start to the game took the air out of Dodger Stadium, and Yesavage made sure it never returned. As the series heads back to Toronto, here are four takeaways from Game 5.Their dominant pitching and sweep of the Brewers masked it, but the Dodgers bats haven’t been clicking for some time now. Los Angeles managed only 15 runs across four games in the NLCS, and has scored just 18 in the Fall Classic. And no matter what tweaks Roberts makes, it hasn’t seemed to make a difference.by moving Mookie Betts from second to the No. 3 hole, and shifting Will Smith up to No. 2. And after resisting for the entire playoffs, he finally decided to bench center fielder Andy Pages, who was 4-for-50 during the postseason with zero walks. None of it mattered. Too many key Dodgers bats are slumping at the wrong time. Betts is 3-for-23 this series, and has just one extra-base hit in his last 52 plate appearances. Tommy Edman is 3-for-21. Since his home run in Game 2, Max Muncy is 1-for-13 with five strikeouts. Roberts can reshuffle things all he wants to, but with the Dodgers’ backs against the wall, none of it is likely to wake the lineup out of its prolonged, ill-timed slumber.Blue Jays pitcher Trey Yesavage limited the Dodgers to one run on three hits in seven innings. / Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated Of course, Yesavage was the main reason why the Dodgers’ offense struggled on Wednesday. With the way he threw the ball, few lineups would have put up much of a fight against him. For the second time in this series, the rookie outpitched the two-time Cy Young Award winner. Yesavage, who made his big-league debut on Sept. 15, was simply brilliant. He struck out every Dodgers hitter at least once, and two of the three hits he gave up didn’t leave the infield. He struck out five consecutive hitters at one point, and after giving up a solo homer to Kiké Hernández in the bottom of the third, retired 13 of the last 16 batters he faced. Of the 104 pitches Yesavage threw on the night, Dodgers hitters swung at 52 of them. They whiffed 23 times, marking the most swings-and-misses in a World Series game since tracking began in 2008. It was a breathtaking performance, particularly considering the 22-year-old had made just three major league appearances before manager John Schneider opted to include him in his playoff rotation. Yesavage hasn’t flinched on the big stage yet, and his latest gem has the Blue Jays on the precipice of an upset title few predicted before this series began.More and more, Game 3 is looking like the exception rather than the rule. In the 18-inning Dodgers win, their bullpen fired 13 1/3 innings and gave up just one run. Excluding that game, the group has allowed nine earned runs in 8 1/3 frames. On Wednesday, Snell exited the game with runners on first and second and two outs, with the deficit still a manageable 3–1. Edgardo Henriquez came in and immediately allowed both inherited runners to score—one on a wild pitch and one on a single. He faced three hitters and retired none of them. This appears to be another area where, no matter where Roberts turns, he finds himself with few attractive options . With Yoshinobu Yamamoto set to take the mound in a do-or-die Game 6 Friday, it would surprise no one if he once again goes the distance and saves Roberts from having to choose from a series of bad options.Yesavage might have something to say about this after his historic performance, but Guerrero remains the greatest force of nature in this series. He’s reached base in every game, reached base multiple times in four out of five games and has run his Fall Classic slash line to .363/.500/.636. No Dodgers pitcher has made him look uncomfortable.and Bo Bichette still dealing with a knee injury, Toronto was down two of its biggest stars. Guerrero stepped up in their absences and then some, and, if the Blue Jays can scrape across one more win, he’ll have some hardware to show for it.Nick Selbe is a programming editor at Sports Illustrated who frequently writes about baseball and college sports. Before joining SI in March 2020 as a breaking/trending news writer, he worked for MLB Advanced Media, Yahoo Sports and Bleacher Report. Selbe received a bachelor's in communication from the University of Southern California.
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