Even playing in their raucous Rogers Centre north of the border in the opener Friday, the cute little Toronto Blue Jays were supposed to be a far inferior team, eh?
Uhhhh…
For baseball’s burgeoning dynasty, there suddenly looms disaster. For the dominating Dodgers, this is now a World Serious.
The Blue Jays didn’t just win Game 1, they hammered the Dodgers into a maple-leafy pulp, 11-4, battering their ace and bruising their ego and sending a message.
It was delivered in the ninth inning, when the fans rained a chant down on Shohei Ohtani, who spurned the Blue Jays in his free agent sweepstakes two years ago and whose two-run homer meant nothing Friday night.
“We don’t need you… we don’t need you.”
When the game ended shortly and mercifully thereafter, another unspoken message had been sent.
You know where you can stick your broom…
Truly, the only thing getting swept in this series is the Dodgers’ aura of invincibility, as the Blue Jays did exactly what they needed to do by hitting them precisely where it hurts.
Welcome to the postseason, Dodger bullpen.
Now get lost.
Wearing down ace Blake Snell for 29 pitches in the first inning and 100 pitches by the sixth, the pesky Blue Jays hitter loaded the bases with none out when Snell left the game for the maligned and recently ignored Dodger relievers.
Rather predictably, all Hortons broke loose.
Emmet Sheehan lasted four hitters and allowed three baserunners. Ernie Clement singled in a run, Nathan Lukes walked to force in a run and Andrés Giménez singled in a run, and have you ever heard of any of those guys?
Enter Anthony Banda, and exit an Addison Barger fly ball into the right-field stands for the first pinch-hit grand slam in World Series history. Add an ensuing single by Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and a home run from Alejandro Kirk and you pretty much get the picture.
The Dodgers gave up nine runs in the sixth inning, more than twice as many runs as they gave up in the entire four-game National League Championship Series win against the Milwaukee Brewers.
Worse yet, they allowed, for the first time this postseason, some doubt.
Did the seven days off since the NLCS sweep ruin their timing as brief October vacations have done to Dodger teams in the past? After all, this is the fifth time in World Series history a team coming off a sweep played a team that was stretched to seven games, and in the previous four times, the team that was stretched won the series.
The Dodgers will roll out another ace, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, in Game 2 Saturday. He pitched a complete game in his last start, so maybe there’s no cause to worry.
Or maybe the Blue Jays just gave them 11 good reasons to worry.
After all, Toronto began the game as a heavy underdog, and for three good reasons, but none of their fears were realized.
They were starting Trey Yesavage, a rookie pitcher who began the season in the Class-A Florida State League pitching for the Dunedin Blue Jays in front of 328 fans against the Jupiter Hammerheads. The 22-year-old was the second-youngest starting pitcher in World Series opener history. He had made just six total major-league starts, and just last week was shelled for five runs in four innings by the Seattle Mariners in the ALCS.
”I don’t want to be out there on the mound thinking too much because for me, I’m at best when I’m just black dead out there and not thinking at all,” he said before the game.
He indeed seemed clueless, but he survived three walks and four hits in four innings by yielding just two runs.
Second, the Jays were starting Bo Bichette at second base even though he had not played the position in six years and never in the major league. The team’s standout shortstop, had also not played anywhere in 47 days since he was sidelined with a sprained knee.
“Yeah, it’s crazy,” said Bichette.
You know what’s crazier? He singled, walked, turned a double play, and made a great stop-and-throw on a grounder before being removed for a pinch-runner in the sixth
Third, the Blue Jays were also starting an outfield trio known only to family and close friends. Kudos to all those who had Myles Straw, Daulton Varsho and Davis Schneider on your bingo card.
Varsho homered. Enough said.
“I think that there’s a lot of firsts for a lot of these guys… I think that players are going to feel certain things that they haven’t felt before,” said Jays manager John Schneider beforehand.
Afterward, that applied to the suddenly shaken Dodgers.
When Dodgers Manager Dave Roberts was asked Friday afternoon about the pressure his team felt, he said, “None. None whatsoever.”
PHILADELPHIA — Even Dodgers fans steeped in the lore of Kirk Gibson might not remember the name of Mel Didier.
Didier was the scout who had issued this warning to the 1988 Dodgers: If you’re facing Dennis Eckersley, the mighty closer for the Oakland Athletics, and the count runs full, he’s going to throw a backdoor slider.
Eckersley threw it, Gibson hit it for a home run, and the Dodgers went on to win the World Series.
If these Dodgers go on to win the World Series, no one will struggle to remember the name of Mookie Betts, of course. On Monday, however, Betts pushed the Dodgers to within one win of the National League Championship Series — not with his bat and not with his glove, but with memory and aptitude to rival Didier.
“His mind is so far advanced,” Dodgers coach Dino Ebel said of Betts. “That was the ballgame right there.”
With the tying run at second base and none out in the ninth inning, he was the calm in a screaming madhouse. As the Dodgers infielders gathered at the mound and Alex Vesia entered from the bullpen, Betts thought back to a play he had participated in once, in an August game against the Angels. Miguel Rojas had taught him the so-called “wheel play.”
“All he had to do was tell me once,” Betts said. “To me, that was like a do-or-die situation. Them tying the game up turns all the momentum there. If we can find a way to stop it, that would be great.
“I just made a decision and rolled with it.”
On the mound, amid the bedlam, Betts put on the wheel play. It’s a bunt coverage: with a runner on second base, the third baseman and first baseman charge home, with the idea that one would field the bunt and throw out the runner at third.
In any previous decade, the Dodgers would have practiced this play in spring training, repeatedly.
“We don’t really even practice the wheel play, with pitchers not hitting any more,” third baseman Max Muncy said. “There’s very few times where you’re 100% sure that a guy is going to bunt.”
This was the time. The Phillies had opened the ninth with three consecutive hits, including a two-run double from Nick Castellanos.
The Dodgers led 4-3 with none out and Castellanos on second base. Phillies manager Rob Thomson said he wanted to play for the tie and take his chances to match his team’s bullpen against the Dodgers bullpen in extra innings.
And for the “never bunt” crowd: the chance to score one run is slightly higher with a runner on third base with one out than with a runner on second base and none out. The Phillies had the bottom of the order coming up — starting with infielder Bryson Stott, whom the Dodgers had evaluated as a good bunter.
Betts remembered how he had asked Rojas when to run the wheel play.
“In a do-or-die situation,” Rojas had told him.
So Betts took charge and put on the play.
“I don’t know if it was very comfortable, but somebody’s got to do it,” Betts said.
“I figured, if there was ever a good time to make a decision and roll with it, that was the time.”
Dodgers third baseman Max Muncy throws to third after fielding a bunt from Phillies second baseman Bryson Stott in the ninth inning in Game 2 of the NLDS on Monday.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)
Muncy would charge and, if the ball was bunted to him, would throw to Betts covering third base. First baseman Freddie Freeman then said he would charge and, if the ball was not bunted to him, would cover second base so Stott could not advance there, since second baseman Tommy Edman would be covering first. Later, on his PItchCom, Vesia said he heard an order to cover second base.
“When Doc came out and made the pitching change, we talked to him about it and he was all on board,” Muncy said. “I am going to credit Mook. It was his idea.”
Said Betts: “That was one of times where Doc called on us and said, you guys figure it out — in a very positive way. And we did.”
Rojas called Betts “an extension of the manager on the field.”
Said Rojas: “I’m happy that he called it right there on the field. Because it was the right play with the right runner, knowing the guy was going to bunt.”
All of this speaks well of Betts’ intuition and intelligence, but the postseason is not the time for “trust the process” blather. The postseason is the time when the right call is the one that actually works.
For Stott or anyone else, Thomson said, a batter that sees the wheel play in motion should forget about the bunt and swing away, given the holes left by two infielders charging the plate and the other two rushing to cover a base.
Stott bunted.
The first problem for the Phillies was that they had no one available to pinch-run for Castellanos. Aside from a backup catcher, they had two position players left: Harrison Bader, playing with a sore groin, and Weston Wilson, whom the Phillies had to save to run for Bader.
The second problem for the Phillies was that the Dodgers had only run the wheel play once this season, so even the best advance scouts could not have been warning the Phillies to beware.
“It’s something we have under our sleeve,” Rojas said.
The third and most critical problem for the Phillies was that Betts had lingered close to second base, shadowing Castellanos. By the time Stott could have seen Betts take off for third, it was too late.
“Mookie did a great job of disguising the wheel play,” Thomson said.
Muncy fielded the ball cleanly, and Betts beat Castellanos to the bag by so much that Betts had time to drop his knee and block the bag before tagging out Castellanos, holding onto the ball even as Castellanos upended him.
“Those guys executed it to perfection,” Roberts said. “It was a lot tougher — they made it look a lot easier than it was. And for me, that was our only chance, really, to win that game in that moment.”
If Muncy did not field the ball cleanly or did not make a good throw, or if Betts did not beat Castellanos to the bag or tag him out, the Phillies would have had the tying run at third base and the winning run at first base with none out.
But they did not, which meant the ensuing single did not tie the score. Two batters later, the Dodgers had won.
The play would be difficult enough for a lifelong shortstop. Betts is in his first season as a full-time shortstop.
“It shows his intuition in the game,” Muncy said. “It’s second to none out there. It doesn’t matter what position you put that guy at — he knows what’s going on. It’s honestly really impressive.”
Said Ebel: “He’s obsessed with being a great player. And he’s still learning. He’s still going to get better. That’s the scary thing about it.”
As the Dodgers headed for a happy flight back to Los Angeles, Betts offered this game a five-star review.
“I’ll take off my Dodgers hat and just put on a fan hat,” he said. “I think that was a really dope baseball game.”
Hunter Greene had 12 strikeouts in 6 1/3 innings, Noelvi Marte homered, doubled and drove in two runs, and the Cincinnati Reds beat the Angels6-4 on Tuesday night.
Jose Trevino scored on a sacrifice fly by TJ Friedl and Gavin Lux followed with an RBI double off Kenley Jansen (5-3) in the ninth inning to give Cincinnati a 6-4 lead.
Miguel Andujar was three for four with a double and two RBIs.
Greene gave up three runs and six hits and walked none. Luis Mey (2-0) pitched the eighth inning and gave up Jo Adell’s second solo homer of the game but got the win.
Elly De La Cruz walked with two out in the fifth and then scored from first base on a single by Andujar.
Mike Trout doubled and then scored when Taylor Ward hit the next pitch — a 100-mph fastball — to right field for a single in the first. Adell hit a solo homer in the seventh.
De La Cruz singled to lead off the fourth and scored when Andujar hit the fourth consecutive sinker thrown by Kyle Hendricks for a double. After Austin Hays walked, Marte doubled to drive in Andujar and give the Reds a 3-1 lead.
Marte extended his hitting streak to 10 games.
Key moment
After Marte struck out swinging to lead off the ninth, Trevino singled, Ke’Bryan Hayes was hit by a pitch and pinch-hitter Will Benson walked to load the bases before Friedl gave Cincinnati the lead for good.
Key stat
Greene is the first Reds pitcher to strike out at least 12 batters and walk none since Johnny Cueto on June 11, 2014.
Up next
Cincinnati’s Nick Martinez (10-9, 4.73 ERA) is set to pitch Wednesday against Yusei Kikuchi (6-8, 3.52) to wrap up a three-game series.
For months, candidates in the race to become California’s next governor had waited for a pivotal question to be settled: Will former Vice President Kamala Harris run or not?
With Harris’ announcement this week that she’s out, a new question arose: Who’s the front-runner now?
Because of Harris’ star power, the answer is far from simple. For months, other candidates saw their campaign planning and fundraising undercut by the possibility she would run, meaning the race got a big reset seconds after Harris made her announcement Wednesday.
Some political observers give the nod to former U.S. Rep. Katie Porter, who appears to have a small leg up over her opponents.
Porter was the only Democrat to receive double-digit support in multiple polls when Harris was not included in the field.
A prodigious fundraiser while she was in Congress representing an Orange County district, Porter reported a strong infusion of cash in the months after launching her campaign in March, and said she raised $250,000 in the 36 hours after Harris’ announcement.
Katie Porter, a lawyer who served as a U.S. representative from California from 2019 to 2025, speaks at the Women’s Caucus at the California Democratic Party Convention at the Anaheim Hilton and Convention Center in May.
(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)
“The enthusiasm we’re seeing from donors at every level shows that Californians know how critical this race is,” Porter said in an email blast.
Other candidates — including Xavier Becerra, U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services in the Biden administration and a former California attorney general — have also tried to assert that, with Harris out, they are moving up.
“BECERRA CAMPAIGN BUILDING MOMENTUM IN ‘WIDE OPEN’ RACE,” read the subject line of an email sent Friday by the Becerra campaign, saying he is “well-positioned to unite a broad swath of voters around his plans to make health care and housing less expensive and more accessible.”
Xavier Becerra, attorney and former United States secretary of Health and Human Services, speaks at the labor caucus at the California Democratic Party Convention at the Anaheim Hilton and Convention Center in May.
(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)
Outside observers, however, said that none of the candidates really stand out from the pack at the moment.
“That these remaining candidates are jockeying for bragging rights about who may be the front-runner — it’s to be expected, but it’s ludicrous,” said Garry South, a veteran Democratic strategist who has worked on a number of past gubernatorial campaigns, including for former Gov. Gray Davis.
“With Harris opting out, there will likely be no obvious front-runner among the remainder of the current field for quite some time,” South said. “None of these candidates start out with statewide name recognition.”
With such a wide-open field, factors such as endorsements and communication strategies will be important to watch, experts said. So will the candidates’ ability to raise money and use it to broaden their appeal.
“I would start spending money on social media, on television advertising, on every single platform I could find to build up my name ID,” South said, but “none of them have enough money to do that at the moment.”
Experience and endorsements
With Harris out, will she back someone else?
“Obviously if she did endorse, that would be a big plus” for whichever candidate she rallied behind, said John Pitney, a professor of politics at Claremont McKenna College.
Harris has long relationships with several of the candidates in the race. A source familiar with her thinking told The Times after Harris bowed out that she was still considering whether and how to approach the governor’s race.
Other endorsements could affect the race as well. Hours after Harris announced her decision, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco), the influential former House Speaker, appeared on CNN to endorse Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis, whom she has known for years.
“We have many great candidates, one in particular Eleni Tsakopoulos, whom I support,” Pelosi said, referring to Kounalakis by her maiden name.
Eleni Kounalakis, lieutenant governor of California, speaks at the Women’s Caucus at the California Democratic Party Convention at the Anaheim Hilton and Convention Center in May.
(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)
Kounalakis’ father, the wealthy developer Angelo Tsakopoulos, helped bankroll an independent expenditure committee supporting his daughter’s 2018 campaign for lieutenant governor. Political observers are watching to see if he dumps money into a similar effort backing her gubernatorial campaign.
Pitney said Pelosi’s opinion “would carry a lot more weight” if she were still speaker. He said it “isn’t necessarily going to sway a large chunk of the electorate,” but could be important if it sways Bay Area donors.
A former GOP legislative aide and national party staffer who renounced his membership in the Republican Party the night Trump was elected in 2016, Pitney said that endorsements are far from a determining factor in today’s political landscape.
“I hesitate to rule anybody out, because very often candidates seem to come out of nowhere — like Mamdani in New York City,” he said, referring to the sudden rise and stunning upset primary win of 33-year-old democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani in the New York mayoral race.
Pitney added that experience in government and administrative leadership also matters, but could also cut against candidates at a time when many voters are frustrated and want something new.
Antonio Villaraigosa speaks to the Latino Caucus at the Calififornia Democratic Convention at the Anaheim Convention Center in May..
(Carlin Stiehl/Los Angeles Times)
For example, Antonio Villaraigosa, the former state Assembly speaker and L.A. mayor who is in his 70s, “obviously has a long history, but that long history is both an advantage and a disadvantage,” Pitney said.
Villaraigosa has said his campaign is “about the future.” But voters “may not regard him as a fresh face,” Pitney said.
Name recognition and money
None of the current candidates for governor have the same profile as Harris. In fact, they are broadly unknown to huge swaths of the electorate.
That means they have their work cut out for them, Pitney and South said — namely in terms of fundraising.
South said that there “is no question that the Democratic donor base has basically been sitting on their haunches waiting to see what Harris is going to do.”
But, he said, he hasn’t seen any sign yet that donors have picked a favorite candidate now that she’s out, either — which is a problem for candidates with little or no name recognition.
“None of these candidates in the remaining field with Harris out have enough money in the bank to run a statewide campaign for governor,” he said.
South said that could change if Kounalakis gets another major infusion of cash from her father and once again taps her personal wealth.
At the same time, there could also be a “huge blowback” from that sort of splashy family spending, South said, especially if Kounalakis’ opponents pounced on it as distasteful.
“We have not tended in this state to elect moneyed people who try to buy the governor’s race,” he said.
South said he is watching to see if big Bay Area donors decide to back Porter “because of her profile as a progressive.”
Los Angeles developer and 2022 mayoral candidate Rick Caruso “could be a force” if he were to enter the race, Pitney said, because “he has prominence in Southern California and also has a lot of money.”
Fundraising reports
The most recent fundraising reports, which were due Thursday night, shine a light on candidates’ coffers — but only through the end of June, well before Harris dropped out.
The Democrats who do not have the potential to self-fund their campaigns reported having millions of dollars in cash on hand as of June 30, including some who transferred money from prior campaign committees to their gubernatorial accounts.
Former legislative leader Toni Atkins reported having $4.3 million in the campaign, while raising $648,000 and spending $549,000 in the first six months of this year.
Gubernatorial candidate Toni Atkins speaks to supporters at the California Democratic Convention at the Anaheim Convention Center in May.
(Carlin Stiehl/Los Angeles Times)
Villaraigosa raised $1.1 million and spent $550,000 this year, but reported $3.3 million cash on hand based on fundraising he did last year.
Becerra had $2.1 million in the bank after raising $2.5 million and spending $449,000 in the first six months of the year.
Porter reported raising $2.5 million and spending $449,000 since launching her campaign in March. She said she has $2.1 million in the bank.
Unlike the other candidates, Porter’s campaign revealed her fundraising because her filing on the state disclosure website didn’t show any dollar figures.
Spokesman Nathan Click said her number of small-dollar donors crashed the state’s system, and that they had been working with state officials to get the documents displayed on the secretary of state’s website all day Friday. He said most of Porter’s 34,000 donors contributed less than $200 each.
Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco reported raising $1.6 million and spending $609,000 this year, leaving him with $1 million in the bank.
A few candidates reported mediocre fundraising numbers, but have personal wealth they can draw on.
Kounalakis raised just over $100,000 and spent nearly three times as much during the first half of this year. She has more than $4.6 million on hand and millions more in her lieutenant governor campaign account, although some of that money can’t be transferred because of campaign finance rules.
Businessman Stephen J. Cloobeck, a Los Angeles Democrat, raised about $160,000 and spent $1.5 million — including more than $1 million on consultants. He had about $729,000 on hand at the end of the period. He also said he made a $10-million contribution Friday that he said “turbocharged” his campaign.
Philanthropist and businessman Stephen Cloobeck, right, takes a photo with a supporter after speaking about his candidacy for California governor during the labor caucus at the California Democratic Party Convention at the Anaheim Hilton and Convention Center in May.
(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)
“One of my many advantages is that I’m not a politician and I am not compromised,” Cloobeck said.
Former Fox News host Steve Hilton, a Republican candidate, raised about $1.5 million, of which $200,000 was a personal loan. Hilton spent about $1 million and has a little less than $800,000 in the bank.
At the lowest end of the fundraising were former state controller Betty Yee, who raised almost $238,000 and spent $255,000, with $637,000 on hand; and state schools superintendent Tony Thurmond, who raised about $70,000, spent about $180,000 and had almost $560,000 on hand.
Both Yee and Thurmond told The Times last month that fundraising had slowed while Democratic donors waited on Harris to make a decision.
