WORLD SERIES ... is it too early?

 

My connection to baseball runs deep. As a youngster, I was a Dodger. No, not a Los Angeles, a Brooklyn. 

Jackie and Roy and Pee Wee were my guys to cheer for, but I think it was "Duke" Snider and his fabulous moniker that caught my attention.

Duke Snider ... How can you not like a guy named "Duke:

When "The Bums" moved to Los Angeles, I didn't move with them, and my interest in the sport lay dormant until 1977, when the Toronto Blue Jays first took flight. I was at the CNE Grandstand on that April 7th, snowy, overcast day on the 1st base side to cheer for Doug Ault as he hit two home runs and bounced another off the top of the fence. I showed up for 37 more consecutive home openers until 2013.

30 years ago, my son, Sean, created the Ontario Blue Jays Baseball Academy and ran it for more than 25 years, helping more than 400 very talented Canadian ball players earn scholarships to American colleges and universities -- current Major League Baseball's Naylor brothers are only two of the graduates from his program.

The Naylor Brothers ... Josh is now a star with Seattle

When the Jays' Joe Carter hit his World Series-winning home run in 1993, the ball landed just three rows in front of me in left field.

I've seen lots of baseball. 

Often, like you, I see something in the game that I've never seen before.

I continue to be amazed at how the game's professional observers create new analytics and ways to explain the sport. They claim ... "it's not just about catch and throw". The analysts attempt to uncover all the numbers that best describe a pro ball player's abilities, and if they can't, they just invent new ones each year.

Baseball's history is rich. Thousands of books have been written about it, and there are too many songs to mention, and it's even made its way to Broadway with DAMN YANKEES and several other baseball-themed plays.

And the star of the show ... Jerry Lewis!

Baseball trivia is part of every fan's toolkit ... "Hey, do you know who replaced Babe Ruth in right field? Oh, Ya, that was George Selkirk from Huntsville, Ontario, and they even gave him Babe Ruth's fabled #3 jersey."

The Canadian kid from Ontario ... "Twinkle Toes" Selkirk how much pressure on this guy
to replace baseball's most beloved player?

And, where would game announcers' on-air patter be without a list of previously unknown facts and figures about some long forgotten rule ... "Hey, do you know how many ways there are to get to first base?

The answer: seven.

I've learned that baseball is all about numbers ... odds and probability. And, the numbers don't lie.

The LA Dodgers' active roster salary for the 2025 season was just over $300 million -- a very, very big number. As fans, we know about momentum and grit and luck from the baseball gods. Sometimes a team will win games they shouldn't or catch an elusive lucky streak at just the right time. But if a team pays the most for their players, odds are, given enough time, they will deliver the results expected of them.

What happened to the Jays (and you and me) on November 1 shouldn't be that much of a surprise. Disappointing as hell, but we shouldn't be that surprised.

Often, a dastardly surprise like the one that ran over us comes from an unexpected source ... maybe even from an expensive asset that really hasn't previously contributed.

This time, in Game 7, the unlikely candidate was the Dodgers' #9 hitter, Rojas, who had been struggling at the plate. Until that late-in-the-game appearance, he had only one hit in more than 40 playoff chances. I thought ... "odds say he's due". He didn't disappoint the odds.

Rojas ... the unlikely hero.

He, not one of the other multi-millionaires, with a 3 and 2 count, facing Jay closer, Hoffman, launched a frozen rope into the seats in left field to tie the game.

Then, while the Jays had bases loaded in the following inning, he, not one of the other multi-millionaires, snagged a hard-hit infield grounder and, off-balance, made a perfect throw to home plate, beating the charging Jay runner by no more than an inch.

... incidentally, Hoffman, the Jay closer, came to us from the Philadelphia Phillies. Do you remember the former Jay fireballing closer, Jordan Romano? He went to the Phillies from the Jays this season (he was also one of my son's students). 

Romano ... tell me again ... why did we get rid of him?

Rojas was an unlikely hero.

Baseball is full of them. 

Ya know ... Varsho, Barger and don't forget that little chubby catcher. These heroes often show up when the odds say they're due.

Baseball is a turn-the-page sport. What happened in yesterday's game doesn't mean you can expect the same result in today's game. Super-Duper Dodger star, Othani, is a good example. We saw him clobber 2 home runs and 2 doubles in Game 4, then he went quiet for the next 3 games.

Mister Baseball

Major League Baseball has been around for 122 years. They like tradition. They thrive on it. They don't like Cinderella Stories. And they don't like youngsters from Buffalo and 22-year-old starters and players who start the season in "A" ball and somehow show up in their World Serious. 

Game seven's result was predetermined -- you and I sorta felt that right after the anthems were sung. The baseball gods of numbers and odds made sure Cinderella was nowhere to be found and gave us an extra-innings finish that will take a while to put behind us.

The Jays defied all logic and made it all the way from a very slow start in the spring to Game 7 in the World Series in November. Fabulous!

But their 2025 postseason success may not come around again for a while. The numbers say they'll have trouble repeating next year -- odds are, it won't happen.

Bo and his Bro

If you happen to see Bo Bichette aimlessly wandering the streets of Toronto, tell him we love the way he led our team and how he put our team and city back on the baseball map after a very long absence and how we desperately want him back in Blue Jay colours for a very long time beside his buddy Junior.

For now, it's been 25 years since the last Back-to-Back championship win. The Dodgers of Los Angeles earned it. 

They were due. 

... for the first time in history ... the national sport of the United States of America started and finished the World Series in a country other than the United States. 

... talk about Back-to-Back ... how good were Cito Gaston's Jays of 1992-93? To date, 5 players from those teams have become honoured members of Baseball's Hall of Fame -- how many of the 2025 Jays will eventually be invited to join them? 

If you have an interest in reading other sports and entertainment essays that include: Bill Cosby, Sinatra, Bobby Hull, Lafleur, the guy who invented the slap shot, the world's best athlete that nobody knows and even "

The Mount Rushmore (of hockey) ... click on the link below.

allworldhockey.blogspot.com