Culture at heart of Blue Jays’ World Series run
TORONTO – Whether it was at the draft, the trade deadline, or during free agency, Ross Atkins has always emphasized the importance of values during his decade as general manager of the Toronto Blue Jays.
Every time there was a potential addition to the team, Atkins never failed to mention their “high character.”
He believes that policy has paid off in 2025, with the Blue Jays reaching the World Series for the first time in 32 years in large part thanks to their cohesiveness and dedication to each other.
“I’ve always been taught and learned and believed strongly that hiring and identification of — whether it be players, coaches, scouts, anyone that’s helping support the organization — that hiring’s the most important thing we do,” said Atkins during a news conference on Friday before Game 1 of the World Series. “If you do that with values that are important to you, then over time, that’s going to pay off for you.”
Atkins said that centring the team’s personnel policy and the resulting atmosphere is something that he and manager John Schneider actually spoke about earlier in the week.
“The thing that I think about the most is the relationships, the people that we have hired and the people that we have grown with together,” said Atkins, who was hired as the team’s GM in December 2015. “I’ve always felt there’s a big group of people here that I’m working with that will, for sure, be lifelong relationships and lifelong friendships.
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“This success — albeit we’re not done, with work to do — not just this year, but well beyond, I think just emboldens that feeling of how powerful these relationships will be.”
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Toronto led all of Major League Baseball with 49 come-from-behind wins in the regular season, with 12 of those victories coming when the Blue Jays trailed by at least three runs.
They also rallied from a 2-0 deficit to the Seattle Mariners in the best-of-seven American League Championship Series. The climactic Game 7 in Toronto was capped by George Springer’s three-run homer in the seventh inning, undoing Seattle’s early 3-1 lead in that series finale.
“I think that’s what forms a good team. It’s talent and it’s players, but it’s people,” said Schneider before the World Series began. “I think that we’ve done such a phenomenal job of creating a culture where people are just welcome.
“It’s what we’ve grasped on to, the standard we’ve set. Not just the type of player we want, but the type of people we want in here, too.”
Schneider has been with the Blue Jays organization since 2002 when he was drafted in the 13th round of that year’s draft. He retired from playing after the 2007 season due to three concussions suffered that year, then became a minor-league manager for the rookie-level Gulf Coast League Blue Jays in 2008, working his way up through the franchise’s different levels of ball.
He said that the relationships that have been built in Toronto during Atkins’s tenure has helped create the culture that made the Blue Jays (94-68) playoff run possible.
“I think that when you’re trying to establish a winning environment and a winning organization that can do it repeatedly, that people come into play,” said Schneider. “People that are going to push things forward and not be satisfied.
“Even this year, when we acquired (infielder Andres Gimenez) and signed (Anthony Santander) and signed Max (Scherzer), we were talking about what that would do for people around them too and where the people that we had already were in their career and in their lives.”
Schneider said it was also a factor in July as Major League Baseball’s trade deadline approached and the Blue Jays were gearing up for a deep post-season run.
“It was cool to have those conversations with Ross, understanding what we were doing at the time, and not trying to disrupt that,” said Schneider. “You want to try to add people that are going to help.
“So Seranthony (Dominguez), who is about as selfless as there is, Louis Varland, Ty France, they’re good pieces for what we already have, too. We made it a point to be really aware of it this year and, again, it’s been a couple years in the making to get to this point.”
Varland and France were traded to Toronto by the Minnesota Twins on July 31 for Alan Roden and Kendry Rojas. Varland, who has become a fixture in the Blue Jays bullpen in the post-season, said that the strong culture on his new team was immediately apparent.
“From the coaching staff to the players to the support staff to the chefs, like everybody’s great, everybody’s friendly, welcoming,” he said. “I saw this the other day, ‘the Glue Jays.’
“That’s, like, a perfect way to sum it up. Everybody’s so close and everybody’s a great guy or girl.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 26, 2025.
© 2025 The Canadian Press
TORONTO – When the Toronto Blue Jays clinched a trip to the World Series, veteran pitcher Max Scherzer was emotional about getting another chance to play in the Fall Classic.
Scherzer will be Toronto’s starter for Game 3 of the World Series on Monday when Major League Baseball’s championship moves to Los Angeles, meaning he’ll pitch in the World Series for a fourth time.
The teams split the first two games in Toronto, with the Jays winning Game 1 11-4 and the defending champion Dodgers bouncing back in Game 2 with a 5-1 victory.
The 41-year-old Scherzer said it was “awesome” when Blue Jays manager John Schneider confirmed that he’d be returning to the mound on the game’s biggest stage.
“This is what you play for, to be able to get to this spot, to get to this moment, to have a shot at it,” said Scherzer before Game 2 at Rogers Centre. “There’s so many great players that have never gotten to a World Series, so many great players where they only have one World Series.
“I absolutely respect playing in a World Series, what that means, and absolutely cherish these opportunities. When I get a chance to get the ball, man, this means everything.”
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The right-hander has a 221-117 record over 18 MLB seasons with the Arizona Diamondbacks, Detroit Tigers, Washington Nationals, Los Angeles, New York Mets, Texas Rangers and Toronto. He has a 3.22 earned-run average over his career with 3,489 strikeouts.
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Scherzer has won the Cy Young Award three times, being recognized as the best pitcher in the American League in 2013 with Detroit and then in the National League in 2016 and 2017 with Washington. He’s an eight-time all-star and has won the World Series twice, with the Nationals and Texas.
But more than that, Scherzer is a fan of the game and its history.
“Every time you think you can figure out baseball and put it into an equation, baseball has a funny way of shaking that up and making you look at the game in a whole different way,” said Scherzer. “You can’t make baseball into an equation.
“You’ve just got to come every single day ready to play. Anything can happen.”
Scherzer was left off Toronto’s roster for the American League Division Series against the New York Yankees, but then was tabbed to pitch Game 4 of the AL Championship Series against the Seattle Mariners on Oct. 16. He won the game in Seattle, allowing two runs and striking out five over 5 2/3 innings.
Schneider said that it’s been a joy to manage the intense Scherzer who has earned the nickname “Mad Max” over his career for his fiery outbursts on and off the field.
“He was asking what we were doing after Game 7, and I was like, ‘Max, I’m enjoying a beer, man,’” laughed Schneider. “He’s so regimented and wants to know what he’s doing, (because) he’s been through this, too.
“He’s stepped on landmines, he’s dodged landmines in a World Series, in a seven-game series. ‘Here’s my thought. Here’s my feedback. What are you thinking? OK. When do I throw my side?’”
Schneider also named Shane Bieber as the Blue Jays starter for Game 4 on Tuesday. Schneider explained some of the strategy behind his starting pitching selections on Saturday afternoon.
“I think just looking at not having too much of a layoff with Max from his last outing but still giving him some rest,” said Schneider. “Him pitching in that environment (Dodger Stadium) that’s going to be a lot of hoopla, Game 3, much like yesterday — or any game this series.
“He’s pitched in that stadium. It keeps him available for Game 7.”
Dodger manager Dave Roberts announced on Saturday that Tyler Glasnow would take the mound in Game 3 and superstar Shohei Ohtani would start Game 4.
Roberts also managed Scherzer when he was with Los Angeles and he laughed when he was asked what it’s like.
“Max. He’s one of one. Great competitor. Don’t want to touch him during outings, don’t want to pat him on the back side,” said Roberts. “Wants to be the guy. I really enjoyed managing a future Hall of Famer. He’s very smart.
“He’s a baseball player first, then a pitcher.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 26, 2025.
© 2025 The Canadian Press
It was said that the Los Angeles Dodgers were angry after being humiliated by the Toronto Blue Jays in the opening game of the World Series on Friday night.
Yoshinobu Yamamoto certainly pitched like he was absolutely furious.
Toronto’s bats were silenced in Game 2 by a dazzling performance from the Dodgers starter, who allowed just a lone sacrifice fly to Alejandro Kirk over nine brilliant innings. The Jays had just four hits on the night, two of them bloops, and not one after the third inning.
The Dodgers eventually won 5-1, evening the series at a game apiece.
If the Jays launched rockets on Friday, Saturday brought a whole mess of wet firecrackers.
Yamamoto, a 27-year-old from Japan in his second year in the majors, worked with a repertoire that seemed frankly unfair. He struck out Nathan Lukes on a 97-mile-an-hour fastball and froze Daulton Varsho on a 77-mile-an-hour curveball, while also mixing in a sharp, hard split-fingered fastball.
Good pitches are often called filthy. This stuff was disgusting. Gross. Cover-your-eyes nasty. You get the idea.
Other than a shaky first inning, Yamamoto had Blue Jays hitters off balance all night, in a way they had not been since Game 5 against Seattle in the American League Championship Series, more than a week ago.
Yamamoto struck out eight Toronto batters and threw 105 pitches for a complete game, which is the modern baseball equivalent of spotting a unicorn.
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A Rogers Centre crowd that began the night rocking and joyous, with franchise legend Joe Carter throwing out the ceremonial first pitch and then hamming it up with the present-day Jays, ended up resigned to its fate as Yamamoto mowed down hitter after hitter. Hopefully not too many attendees were stewing over the prices they had paid on the resale ticket market.
Toronto’s inability to do much of anything at the plate made an unfortunate victim of starting pitcher Kevin Gausman, who was quite filthy himself through six innings before surrendering a pair of solo home runs in the seventh, to Will Smith and Max Muncy.
For a team that has talked so much about the brotherhood and camaraderie that they share in a tight clubhouse, Gausman could be forgiven for wondering if he has caused some sort of offence to his teammates given the lack of run support they have given him.
Gausman also pitched well in both of his starts against Seattle — Games 1 and 5 of the ALCS — but the Jays lost both. Toronto’s potent offence, the best of any playoff team by some distance, backed Gausman with just four runs across his last three starts.
Gausman’s departure after those seventh-inning home runs turned things over to the Blue Jays bullpen, which exposed the soft underbelly of the team.
The Dodgers tacked on two more runs against a series of Jays relievers, more evidence for the pre-series theory that whichever team is forced to go to its bullpen first is in trouble.
And, as if to prove that when things go sideways in the baseball playoffs, they often go really sideways, Toronto’s normally reliable defence helped Los Angeles score both of those runs.
Alejandro Kirk failed to block a pitch in the dirt that allowed a runner to score, and Andres Gimenez tried to turn a double-play on a slow grounder with the bases loaded instead of taking the force out at home. That decision allowed the Dodgers’ fifth run to score when the double-play attempt was unsuccessful.
Given the wet noodles that the Jays were waving at Yamamoto, an extra run felt like it might as well have been a grand slam.
Indeed, the Japanese sensation struck out the side in the eighth inning, at a point in the game when the vast majority of starting pitchers have long since been sent to the showers.
And so now it is off to Los Angeles for the next three games. The Jays will be disappointed to have given up the home-field advantage they brought into the series, but all is not lost. Toronto is 3-2 on the road in these playoffs, and they went to Seattle in the last round, having lost twice and promptly won the next two.
Perhaps more importantly, the Jays’ emphatic Game 1 win proved that they could trade punches with the defending World Series champions and their roster of All-Stars. The Jays haven’t rolled over and had their tummies rubbed.
Sometimes, a baseball team runs into a pitcher who is simply unhittable. The hard thing to fathom is that, with the way Yamamoto has been pitching — he also threw a complete game in the National League Championship Series, which is downright freaky — he was still not the Dodgers’ choice to be the Game 1 starter. The Los Angeles rotation is that good.
If the series does end up coming back to Toronto, Yamamoto would likely be the Game 6 starter for the Dodgers. It’s probably best for Jays fans not to think about that possibility just now.
TORONTO – One of the highlights of Toronto skipper John Schneider’s first day at the World Series — aside from the 11-4 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers — was getting a chance to connect with former Blue Jays manager Cito Gaston.
“He’s always been great to me,” Schneider said before Game 2 on Saturday. “He just said, ‘I love what you’re doing, I love the way your team plays and you should be very proud of what you’ve done.’
“And I said, ‘That means a lot coming from you.’”
Gaston, who threw the ceremonial first pitch to Schneider before Game 1, guided the Blue Jays to World Series titles in 1992 and ’93.
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After throwing the pitch, the 81-year-old Gaston asked Schneider to autograph the ball for him since he planned to put it on his mantle.
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“I did and I made him a promise that I need to get one from him,” Schneider said with a smile.
DOGGED APPROACH
Blue Jays catcher Tyler Heineman said his team is well aware the defending-champion Dodgers entered the World Series as heavy favourites.
Los Angeles dropped only one playoff game entering the Fall Classic and boasts a lineup that includes sluggers Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman and others.
At the start of the series, the Dodgers were listed as a -220 favourite on BetMGM to win the series while the Blue Jays were at +180.
“We know we’re severe underdogs but that doesn’t matter to us,” Heineman said. “We were severe underdogs at the beginning of this season. We weren’t even supposed to be in the playoffs, yet alone the World Series.
“To the group inside (the clubhouse), that doesn’t hold any weight to us. We know what a special group we have.”
Before Game 2, the sportsbook had L.A. down to a -120 favourite to win the series while the Jays were at +100.
BACK TO BACK
The Dodgers are aiming to become the first team to win consecutive World Series crowns since the New York Yankees won three titles between 1998 and 2000.
Major League Baseball’s current 24-year streak without a repeat champion is the longest of its kind in the history of the so-called Big Four sports (MLB, NBA, NHL, NFL).
The Dodgers are the first defending champions to return to the Fall Classic since the Philadelphia Phillies in 2009.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 25, 2025.
© 2025 The Canadian Press
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