\u201cEven if we\u2019d won,\u201d he mused, \u201cI\u2019d still be sad that it was over.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was the message the Blue Jays repeated over and over in their quiet clubhouse as Saturday night bled into Sunday morning.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody loves each other in here,\u201d said center fielder Daulton Varsho. \u201cWe enjoy being around this group, and that\u2019s probably going to be the most hurtful thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
That they were so close only makes it worse.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt took them seven games to beat us,\u201d said Kevin Gausman, who started Games 1 and 6. \u201cI think if we play tomorrow, we beat \u2019em, but we\u2019re not playing tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n
MORE: World Series Game 7 Takeaways: Dodgers\u2019 Wild Comeback Secures Another Title<\/a><\/p>\n They had so many chances for a different ending. They loaded the bases with two outs in the second. They had runners on first and second with one out in the fourth, and a runner at third with no outs in the fifth. They loaded the bases with one out in the ninth, and they had runners at the corners with one out in the 11th. But they could not come through with a hit to put the Dodgers away, and the Dodgers clawed back with solo homers in the eighth, off Trey Yesavage<\/a>, who started Games 1 and 5; ninth, off closer Jeff Hoffman; and 11th, off Game 4 starter Shane Bieber.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI feel for everybody in here,\u201d said Clement. \u201cWe grinded so hard. I\u2019d go to war with Jeff Hoffman every day of the week. I want him on the mound. I want Biebs on the mound. Those are guys who I would take a bullet for. And 99 times out of 100 those guys get the job done. Obviously, this wasn\u2019t our night here. But I feel for those guys so much.\u201d<\/p>\n Dodgers second baseman Miguel Rojas sent Game 7 to extra innings. \/ Mark Blinch\/Getty Images<\/p>\n The core has been here for a while, but it took them some time to grow into a team that understood its responsibility to its fanbase and to one another. A year ago, nearly the same roster finished 74\u201388. That club did not lack talent, its members say, but it lacked accountability.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe had too many excuses built in,\u201d Bassitt said earlier this week. \u201cWe had too many issues internally. We had too many people complaining, including myself, about the way things were being run or handled and things like that. And as a group, it\u2019s a maturing process. Everyone wrote us off, obviously, after last year, and rightfully so. I don\u2019t discredit that. But the reality is that I think we\u2019ve learned a lot from that. We learned that all those stupid things that we were doing or saying or whatever\u2014it\u2019s not gonna happen. So we [stopped] that this year.\u201d They would spend the period after losses making excuses and then trying to do too much. They struggled to choose an identity or an approach. When things went wrong, they panicked. They didn\u2019t know who they were.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n