![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/70c8fc80.png\")
<\/p>\nEverybody knows that Vladimir Guerrero, Jr., is, as he would say in his native language, en fuego.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Toronto Blue Jays<\/a> first baseman is, in baseball parlance, mashing. He is raking.<\/p>\n But, how much is he mashing and raking? How much fuego\u00a0are we talking about?<\/p>\n Baseball has a statistic, OPS, that combines a player\u2019s ability to get on base and hit for power.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a catch-all stat for a batter\u2019s production at the plate.<\/p>\n The best postseason OPS in major league history belongs to New York Yankees immortals Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, who are tied at 1.214.<\/p>\n Vladdy Junior\u2019s OPS this postseason: 1.337.<\/p>\n He has more home runs (8) than he has strikeouts (5), a fact that seems impossible but is, in fact, true. He\u2019s the first player in MLB history with 25 hits, eight home runs and 15 RBI in a single playoff year.<\/p>\n Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n It is, simply, one of the all-time great postseasons in the history of baseball.<\/p>\n The Toronto Blue Jays have a 3-2 lead in the World Series for a host of reasons, but the performance of their 26-year-old next-gen superstar is at the top of the list. He won the ALCS MVP in the last round against the Seattle Mariners.<\/p>\n And now he\u2019s doing it all over again.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore on Canada The craziest thing about this offensive explosion is that it is coming at the end of Guerrero\u2019s seventh year in the big leagues.<\/p>\n It might seem strange to say it now, but the power surge is something of an outlier.<\/p>\n Did he discover something with his swing? Did he just need the rest that came with a week off after Toronto clinched a first-round playoff bye? Is he swept up in the narrative of leading a team that is collectively playing a little out of its mind?<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tGet breaking National news<\/p>\n For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up for breaking news alerts delivered directly to you when they happen.<\/p>\n He\u2019s had some good seasons, and a couple of great ones, but he\u2019s also had a lot of long stretches where he hasn\u2019t looked anything like the kid who was once the hottest hitting prospect in baseball, the baby-faced teenager with the Hall of Fame father who had a freakishly powerful bat.<\/p>\n It\u2019s not that Guerrero had a poor year \u2014 his OPS of .848 was ninth in the AL \u2014 but it had to make the Blue Jays executives who signed him to a 14-year, US$500-million contract extension in April just a little bit nervous. Had they paid Ferrari prices for what was more like a high-end sedan?<\/p>\n Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n Those questions have been blown away by furious playoff hack after furious hack, like the one that resulted in a laser of a first-inning home run in Game 5 on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n Guerrero is delivering the kind of devastating offensive performance of which Blue Jays fans \u2014\u00a0and executives \u2014 have long dreamed, only he\u2019s doing it on baseball\u2019s biggest stage, and against the toughest pitchers in the sport.<\/p>\n If nothing else, his timing is impeccable.<\/p>\n The funny thing about this run is that it\u2019s probably less surprising to casual baseball fans who don\u2019t closely follow the Blue Jays. Guerrero has long carried a high profile.<\/p>\n There is his famous lineage, but also the joyful way he plays the game, all big smiles and childhood recklessness, the kind of player who will leap into a diving slide to home plate simply because it\u2019s fun.<\/p>\n There\u2019s also his knack for big moments. As a teenager in the minor leagues, he hit a walk-off homer in a spring-training game at Olympic Stadium in Montreal, where he was born during his father\u2019s time with the Expos.<\/p>\n \n\t\tTrending Now\n\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\tMore videos\n\t\t<\/p>\n![\"For](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/national.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Carney-immigration-plan.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/lilly-jack-vigil-2.jpg\")
<\/p>\n