TORONTO \u2014 It is, in fact, possible to tame the Blue Jays lineup.<\/p>\n
It just takes a masterful performance from an ace like Yoshinobu Yamamoto to send the World Series to Los Angeles tied 1-1 because of it.<\/p>\n
A night after the pesky Blue Jays lineup got to Blake Snell and blew open the game against the Dodgers bullpen, Yamamoto took matters into his own hands and never let a reliever touch the ball.<\/p>\n
Yamamoto retired the final 20 batters he faced to finish off a complete-game gem \u2014 his second in a row \u2014 sending the Dodgers to a 5-1 win over the Blue Jays in Game 2 on Saturday night at Rogers Centre.<\/p>\n
Yoshinobu Yamamoto throws a pitch during the sixth inning of the Dodgers\u2019 win over the Blue Jays in Game 2 of the World Series on Oct. 25, 2025. AP<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been playing a long time and haven\u2019t ever seen anything like this,\u201d Mookie Betts said.<\/p>\n
That is because nothing like it had happened since 2001, when Curt Schilling threw three straight complete games in the postseason. <\/p>\n
But after going the distance against the Brewers in Game 2 of the NLCS, Yamamoto became the first pitcher in 24 years to throw back-to-back complete games in the postseason, in an era when the leash on starting pitchers has gotten progressively shorter.<\/p>\n
Will Smith celebrates after hitting the go-ahead homer in the seventh inning of the Dodgers\u2019 win over the Blue Jays in Game 2 of the World Series. Dan Hamilton-Imagn Images<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was one of those things he said before the series: Losing is not an option. And he had that look tonight,\u201d manager Dave Roberts said.<\/p>\n
Making this one more impressive was that it came 24 hours after the Blue Jays had scored 11 runs on 14 hits in Game 1. Yamamoto shut them down, scattering four hits while striking out eight and walking none across 105 pitches.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy pitching style is just keep attacking the zone,\u201d Yamamoto said through an interpreter. \u201cTo be honest, I was not thinking I can complete the game because my pitch count racked up kind of quickly. But I\u2019m very happy I completed the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
George Springer reacts dejectedly after striking out against Yoshinobu Yamamoto in the eighth inning of the Dodgers\u2019 win over the Blue Jays in Game 2 of the World Series. Getty Images<\/p>\n
Will Smith and Max Muncy provided the difference-making swings \u2014 a pair of solo home runs off Kevin Gausman in the seventh inning that broke a 1-1 tie \u2014 to ensure Yamamoto\u2019s effort would not go to waste.<\/p>\n
The Dodgers arrived in the World Series having gone 9-1 through the NL wild-card series, NLDS and NLCS, leaning on their dominant rotation with little in the way of resistance. But after the Blue Jays came out swinging in Game 1, Yamamoto\u2019s masterpiece evened the series headed back to Chavez Ravine.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think coming into this environment, to split is huge,\u201d Betts said. \u201cI think what we were doing before was kind of unheard of. This seems a little more normal.<\/p>\n
Max Muncy belts a solo homer in the seventh inning of the Dodgers\u2019 win over the Blue Jays in Game 2 of the World Series. Nick Turchiaro-Imagn Images<\/p>\n
\u201cJust throwing punches and making them feel it. Those homers definitely helped a lot. Obviously we know they\u2019re not going to give up, they\u2019re going to stand back up and throw punches back. But Yoshi was able to dodge all the punches. He did amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gausman had retired 17 straight batters before Smith took him deep for a 404-foot blast that put the Dodgers ahead 2-1 in the seventh. One out later, Muncy matched Smith, sending a home run of his own into the Blue Jays bullpen for the 3-1 lead.<\/p>\n
Just like that, Yamamoto had all the support he needed, and he only got stronger as the night went on.<\/p>\n
Kevin Gausman is taken out of the game by manager John Schneider during the seventh inning of the Blue Jays\u2019 loss to the Dodgers in Game 2 of the World Series. Getty Images<\/p>\n
After the Dodgers scratched across two more runs in the top of the eighth for some extra breathing room, Yamamoto responded by striking out the side in the bottom of the frame \u2014 against the team that does not strike out.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love feeling that the starter is the best option to go six, seven, eight, and what Yamamoto is doing, nine innings,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cAnd you got to be efficient, you got to have the weapons to be able to take down a lineup three times, four times, whatever it is, and you got to want to do it. So he is a throwback player.\u201d<\/p>\n
After the Dodgers took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first on Smith\u2019s RBI single, the Blue Jays\u2019 best chance for a big inning had come in the bottom of the frame. George Springer led off with a double and Nathan Lukes singled to put runners on the corners with no outs. But Yamamoto wiggled out of trouble by retiring the next three batters \u2014 two on strikeouts \u2014 to strand both runners while throwing 23 pitches.<\/p>\n
The 27-year-old righty did not need more than 14 pitches to get through any of the remaining eight innings, the only run against him coming on Alejandro Kirk\u2019s sacrifice fly in the third.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had to win,\u201d Yamamoto said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO \u2014 It is, in fact, possible to tame the Blue Jays lineup. It just takes a masterful…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16987,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[11921,7482,11922,20,5515,9,11,10,319,11923,2688,11924],"class_list":{"0":"post-16986","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-kevin-gausman","9":"tag-los-angeles-dodgers","10":"tag-max-muncy","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-mlb-playoffs","13":"tag-new-york","14":"tag-new-york-headlines","15":"tag-new-york-news","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-will-smith","18":"tag-world-series","19":"tag-yoshinobu-yamamoto"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16986\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}