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The World Series (finally) starts tonight! Plus a new documentary about the Expos feels awfully familiar in 2025, and I would love to stop writing about the Angels, but they keep doing things. I’m Levi Weaver, here with Ken Rosenthal. Welcome to The Windup!

It’s Time: The World Series (finally) starts tonight!

Here are a few last-minute storylines.

Yes, the Dodgers are significant favorites. They have the biggest star in the sport (and many other really big ones). But as for the idea that they’re “ruining baseball,” Jayson Stark says that’s simply not the case. And it turns out that most of you … agree? I think?

And while the Blue Jays have found themselves coming in second to the Dodgers a fair amount over the last few years, well … they are in the World Series, after all. Eno Sarris dug into the numbers and and found that Vladimir Guerrero Jr. has been swinging the bat harder this postseason — most of the team has, in fact — and it’s paying off.

Personnel-wise, it looks like Toronto will have Bo Bichette back from a knee sprain that has kept him out since Sept. 6. But he might not be limited to DH duties — he took grounders at second base this week and could play there, despite having never having done so in the big leagues.

Meanwhile, the Dodgers are down a reliever, and we’re not sure for how long. Alex Vesia is away from the team due to a “deeply personal family matter.” Here’s hoping for the best.

Tonight: For the Dodgers, it will be Blake Snell and his 0.86 postseason ERA vs. rookie Trey Yesavage for the Blue Jays in Game 1 at 8 p.m. ET on FOX. (Stream on Fubo — try it for free.)

More World Series:

Ken’s Notebook: Notes, heading into Game 1

Yesavage’s rest schedule: His start on Game 1 will be only his fifth as a professional on four days rest, and only his second in the majors. His 23 other starts — in the majors, minors and postseason — have been on five days rest or more. Before deciding on their rotation, the Jays spoke with their medical staff and each pitcher individually. Pitching coach Pete Walker said the 22-year-old is recovering well between starts, and when the Jays asked him his best-case scenario, he said he would be ready for Game 1.

Snell’s new challenge: The only seasons in which Snell threw 180 or more innings were 2018 with Tampa Bay and 2023 with San Diego — his two Cy Young campaigns. Snell missed nearly four months this season with left shoulder inflammation. Now that he is healthy, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts is challenging him to pitch deeper into games, and Snell is embracing that challenge. His eight-inning start against the Brewers in Game 1 of the NLCS was the second-longest of his career, behind only his no-hitter against Cincinnati in 2024.

Mookie Betts’ defense: Notoriously hard on himself, Betts describes this season as his most humbling and the one in which he has learned the most. But while his offensive numbers were the worst of his career, Betts deserves enormous credit for how smoothly he transitioned from right field to shortstop. Betts tied for the major-league lead in Defensive Runs Saved among shortstops and also rated highly in the Statcast metric, Outs Above Average. And he did at 32, an age when most shortstops are slowing down.

Bichette’s return: To understand why the Jays were so eager to activate Bichette, consider the words of Ernie Clement. “In a way he’s been our heart and soul on the offensive side all year,” Clement said. “To have almost 100 RBIs and not hit 20 homers, I don’t think that happens very often. He had so many big hits in big spots with guys on base. Anytime you can add that back into the lineup it’s really going to help.”

Watch This: Who really killed the Expos?

The last time a Canadian team played in the World Series, the 1993 Blue Jays weren’t Canada’s only team. The Montreal Expos were the country’s elder statesmen, having come into existence in 1969 — eight years before the Blue Jays.

So many great players began their career in Montreal: Gary Carter, Vladimir Guerrero (Sr.), Tim Raines, Andre Dawson, Larry Walker and Randy Johnson, just to name a few Hall of Famers. Pedro Martinez became a star there. Before the Expos arrived, the Montreal Royals were a Brooklyn Dodgers affiliate, the first team Jackie Robinson played for after signing with the franchise.

With Toronto hosting Game 1 of the World Series in Toronto tonight, the timing couldn’t be more perfect for Netflix’s new documentary “Who Killed the Montreal Expos?”

The saviors-turned suspects include:

Claude Brochu, who put together a collective of local investors to keep the team in Montreal in 1991. By 1994, the Expos had the best record in the league at 74-40 … until the strike scuttled the second half of the season. Citing $20 million in lost revenue, Brochu jettisoned John Wetteland, Ken Hill, Marquis Grissom and Larry Walker in early 1995. The Expos finished in last place in the division that year.
Lucien Bouchard, Premier of Quebec, who wouldn’t approve public funding for a stadium because things like schools, hospitals and infrastructure needed funding, and he insisted on taking care of those essentials rather than handing over a ballpark to a private entity. How dare he?
Then of course, there are Jeffrey Loria and his stepson David Samson. Loria initially infused the Expos with more cash, but tried to run the Expos like any other MLB team in a market where that wasn’t entirely feasible. He ultimately bought out most of the local minority owners, then jumped ship, buying the Marlins in 2002 and leaving MLB to operate the club. It moved to Washington, D.C. in 2005.

For much of the Expos’ existence, they and their fans were a shining example of what a baseball team could mean to a community. But when the team was no longer able to provide the level of profit desired, it was taken from those fans who had made it a central part of their community.

In the end, what killed baseball in Montreal was the same thing that killed it in Oakland last year: money.

More Expos: Cody Stavenhagen spoke to the photographers who took two now-iconic photos of Guerrero Jr. when he was just “Vlad’s kid” in Montreal.

More Canadian father-son duos: Dan (TV) and Ben (radio) Shulman will be the first father-son duo to call the World Series.

Debacles: More Angels (sorry)

Sorry to keep harping on the Angels (“harp” pun noted but unintentional).

But sheesh. Read this exchange between Sam Blum and Angels GM Perry Minasian about reports of Yusei Kikuchi saying that the A/C didn’t work in the team’s weight room … and then check out the team’s job posting from a few hours later. (Yes, an HVAC tech!)

It’s comical, but not as funny as it would be if it wasn’t happening while more details emerge in the civil trial between the Angels and the family of Tyler Skaggs. The latest revelation: the team didn’t even fire Eric Kay after Skaggs’ death — he was allowed to resign voluntarily.

It’s not the most consequential detail, but it’s not a good look — especially when compared to another situation preceding it:

Graham asked Castro about an incident of alleged impairment involving an employee who was not Kay, and the strict and swift action that Angels HR took to investigate and punish that employee.

In that instance, a 63-year-old longtime custodial worker was fired for drinking a White Claw, a hard seltzer, on her break. The worker told HR that her husband packed the drink, and that she was unaware it had alcohol. She also showed no signs of impairment, Castro acknowledged. Castro said the Angels found her story credible, but the decision came from above Castro to fire her.

More Angels:

Handshakes and High Fives

On the pods: Rates & Barrels looks at some key World Series matchups here, and later today, they’ll talk to beat writers Mitch Bannon and Fabian Ardaya.

Most-clicked yesterday: Jim Bowden on the 10 MLB stars most likely to be traded this offseason.

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