Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Toronto Blue Jays. NL West vs. AL East. Shohei Ohtani vs. Vladimir Guerrero Jr.
It’s time for Game 1 of the 2025 World Series, featuring an L.A. squad looking to repeat as champions against a team that hasn’t won it all since going back-to-back in 1992-93 — and we’re here to get you ready for all the action.
With the first pitch of Game 1 scheduled for 8 p.m. ET at Rogers Centre, we break down the players and matchups that matter most for both teams. We also asked our ESPN MLB experts to make their picks for who will win the Series, how many games it will take and who will be the MVP of this Fall Classic.
Jump to: Dodgers | Blue Jays | Our predictions
Chance of winning: 60.4% | ESPN BET odds: -210
What’s on the line for the Dodgers: History! Big-time history. The Dodgers are looking to become the first repeat champions since the Yankees won three years in a row from 1998 to 2000. L.A. would love to send Clayton Kershaw into retirement as a champion, even if he’ll probably be watching this one from the bench or the bullpen.
And while it’s fair game to hate the Dodgers for buying an entire starting rotation, it’s worth noting they won it all last year with a 98-win regular season and might win this year following a 93-win regular season, but did not win in seasons of 104 wins (2017), 106 wins (2019), 106 wins again (2021) 111 wins (2022) and 100 wins (2023). This could be one of the great dynasties in MLB history but in the eyes of some, they’ll need back-to-back titles to officially earn that designation. — David Schoenfield
Three reasons L.A. can win:
Where the Dodgers are vulnerable: Even a casual observer would quickly note that the Dodgers’ bullpen is still a question mark — especially as compared to the rest of the team. The relievers have compiled a 4.88 ERA in nine playoff games after their 4.21 mark ranked 21st in that category during the regular season.
Manager Dave Roberts left nothing to chance last round, letting his starters throw all but 7 innings against the Brewers with Sasaki picking up 2 of those. Outside of Sasaki, no L.A. reliever has thrown more than 4 innings this postseason. Getting Dodgers starters to high pitch counts is an easier-said-than-done strategy, but it could be a winning one for Toronto because getting into that pen is the Blue Jays’ best chance. — Jesse Rogers
How the Dodgers can pitch Vlad Jr.: The unique thing about Guerrero among other power hitters is his flatter swing plane. This means that while sluggers like Ohtani and the Yankees’ Aaron Judge struggle with flat four-seam fastballs at the top of the zone because their lofted swing plane doesn’t intersect much with that, Guerrero’s comparatively flat swing plane does. Guerrero also has more innate bat control, so his in-zone miss rate is lower, basically missing only on some of the fringes of the zone. But, since he doesn’t lift the ball as well, missing a spot could mean a ball hit 110-plus mph off the bat still isn’t an extra-base hit.
With this in mind, you don’t want to throw Guerrero any fastballs if you can help it and definitely need to keep them away if you’re going to throw some to set up an off-speed pitch. This sets up well for Snell, the Game 1 starter, to work away with fastballs and tunnel them with his emerging changeup.
The power righties on the Dodgers’ staff already tend to work away from right-handed hitters with their fastballs, but Guerrero’s bat speed means he’s even better against cutters/sliders than curveballs/sweepers/changeups/splitters. I’d expect Yamamoto, Glasnow and Ohtani to mix in fastballs away to keep Guerrero off of the steady diet of soft stuff away. Yamamoto’s curveball and splitter are particularly well-suited for this task while Ohtani and Glasnow are more power and velocity-oriented, even with their off-speed stuff. — Kiley McDaniel
Jeff Passan’s inside intel:
Chance of winning: 39.6% | ESPN BET odds: +175
What’s on the line for the Blue Jays: Their first championship since the glory days of 1992-93, when the Jays won back-to-back World Series with two of the most star-studded rosters ever assembled. (Roberto Alomar, Paul Molitor, John Olerud, Rickey Henderson, Joe Carter, Devon White, Dave Winfield, David Cone, Jack Morris, Dave Stewart, Jimmy Key, Juan Guzman, Pat Hentgen, Tom Henke)
A title would also give validation to an organization that has had a lot of success in recent years but went 0-6 in three previous playoff trips this decade. Validation that they made the right move in signing Guerrero to a much-criticized $500 million contract. And, of course, there’s the matter of saving us from the Dodgers ruining baseball.
Three reasons Toronto can win:
Where the Blue Jays are vulnerable: Neither team has a good postseason bullpen ERA but Toronto is more vulnerable in this area, if only because of workload concerns. Hoffman, after an uneven regular season, has been dynamite in the playoffs. None of the rest of the Blue Jays’ relievers have been consistent. Maybe they found something in Chris Bassitt’s Game 7 high-leverage appearance against Seattle, but the key really will be for the Toronto starters to match the innings of their Dodgers counterparts as much as possible. That would simplify matters and keep manager John Schneider from having to improvise to the extent he did to survive the Seattle series. You never know when it comes to bullpens, but one thing we can say for sure is that the Blue Jays had to work a lot harder to get here than the Dodgers. — Bradford Doolittle
How the Blue Jays can pitch Ohtani: Similar to Judge (I broke down how to attack him, too), Ohtani will whiff, strike out and has a longer swing (look for the blue on his Statcast page). You can get him to whiff or make weak contact on the fringes of the strike zone or just outside it, but the price to pay if you miss those spots is heavy. Ohtani likes the ball middle-in and middle-up — that’s where he swings and where he does damage (and he doesn’t miss on middle-middle pitches). In response, pitchers tend to pitch him middle-down and middle-away. Throwing softer stuff (sweepers/curveballs from lefties and changeup/splitters from righties) down and away and four-seam fastballs above the top of the zone to try to get a frustrated chase out of Ohtani seems like the combination to lean into here. For Gausman and Yesavage (great splitters, just OK breaking stuff, medium velocity), that high heater is a little riskier, so leaning on splitters and overall command will be key. — McDaniel
Passan’s inside intel:
Voters: Alden Gonzalez, Paul Hembekides, Kiley McDaniel, Buster Olney, Tim Keown, Doug Glanville, Jesse Rogers, Bradford Doolittle, Tim Kurkjian, Jeff Passan, Tristan Cockcroft
In how many games? Seven (1 vote), six (8 votes), five (2 votes)
MVP: Shohei Ohtani (5 votes), Mookie Betts (2 votes), Blake Snell (2 votes), Teoscar Hernandez (1 vote), Freddie Freeman (1 vote)
Voters: Eric Karabell, David Schoenfield, Jorge Castillo
In how many games? Seven (3 votes)
MVP: Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (3 votes)
Why did you pick the Dodgers to repeat as champions?
The Dodgers are winning the World Series in around 60% of my simulations, and while it’s a toss-up whether a five- or six-game outcome is more likely, I like the longer series because of a combination of Toronto’s momentum and the energy it’ll get from an amped-up home crowd. These are intangible factors but sometimes you play a hunch.
As for why the Dodgers will win …
1. The way they had to juggle starting pitchers all season has ended up having the effect of a carefully orchestrated program of load management. Snell, Glasnow and Ohtani combined for 198 innings during the regular season. Only Yamamoto avoided the IL and he still barely qualified for the ERA title. Now we’re seeing how this quartet looks in high-stakes games with more or less full tanks of proverbial gas. And they look historically good.
2. L.A. has lost only once all postseason despite getting one home run in total out of the trio of Freeman, Betts and Smith. That’s probably not great news for the Blue Jays.
3. The Blue Jays have leaned on the splitter this postseason, as has been oft-noted. In terms of total splitters thrown, they have four of the top 12: Gausman (1st), Yesavage (2nd), Hoffman (8th) and Dominguez (12th).
Well, among the 199 hitters who have seen at least 50 splitters combined during the regular season and playoffs, the WOBA leaderboard against the pitch features: Freeman (.581, 1st), Betts (.579, 2nd), Muncy (.450, 14th) and Ohtani (.409, 21st). Yes, Dodgers pitchers throw a lot of splitters as well, and the Blue Jays have been the best-hitting team in the majors against them (.753 OPS, including the playoffs, versus .725 for the third-ranked Dodgers). But just look at that list of names for the Dodgers. — Doolittle
And why do you think the Blue Jays will win it all?
The Blue Jays are the one AL team that can match up with the Dodgers because they have an offense that can counter the Dodgers’ rotation and its ability to miss bats. The Blue Jays had the lowest strikeout rate in the majors in the regular season (17.8%) and have been even better in the playoffs (14.8%) while averaging 6.5 runs per game and hitting 20 home runs in 11 games.
That’s the primary reason to believe in the Jays, but here are a few of the other reasons why I think they’ll beat the Dodgers:
Finally: The Dodgers bullpen will blow a game. Or two. — Schoenfield