It took all 162 regular season games, but the 2025 playoff field is set. A month-long push for the World Series begins with four wild-card series, including a classic Yankees-Red Sox matchup for the right to play the Toronto Blue Jays.
With stars Shohei Ohtani, Aaron Judge and Bryce Harper in the middle of things, there should be plenty of intrigue. Plus, many of the game’s elite pitchers will be on display, including Game 1 wild-card starters Garret Crochet, Tarik Skubal and Max Fried, plus Ohtani looming later in the week.
Before the action begins Tuesday, we checked in with Sportsnet’s baseball writers on what to expect in the month ahead and what success would look like for the Blue Jays:
1. Which wild-card team has the best shot at a World Series title?
Arden Zwelling: The Dodgers. But it wouldn’t surprise me to see any team in the post-season field reach or win the World Series. The margins in October are so slim.
Jeff Blair: If power-hitting really is the currency of the realm in the post-season, then the New York Yankees have a shot. If pitching and defence wins titles …
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Shi Davidi: It’s really tough to argue against the Yankees on this one after they finished tied with the Blue Jays for best record in the AL, but end up in the wild card because they lost the season series between the clubs. Max Fried and Carlos Rodon front a solid rotation, the bullpen is pretty deep and Aaron Judge is a monster surrounded by dudes who can go deep. They don’t shoot themselves in the foot the way they did before the deadline, which should make them a tough out for the Red Sox and for the Blue Jays in the division series, should they get that far.
David Singh: The Yankees. Hard to discount a lineup as powerful as theirs, and if the bullpen comes together, look out.
Ben Nicholson-Smith: The Dodgers are the clear choice here and I think they have the best shot to go deep, but I’ll also point to the Tigers. Since they clinched a playoff berth on Saturday, they didn’t have to use Tarik Skubal Sunday, setting up the reigning Cy Young winner to face the Guardians in Game 1 Tuesday. With Skubal on the mound and A.J. Hinch calling the shots from the dugout, the Tigers have a real chance to beat the team that eliminated them a year ago and ride Skubal deep into October.
2. Philosophically speaking, where do you land on the spectrum of ‘Playoff baseball is completely random’ to ‘There’s no such thing as a lucky World Series win’?
Jeff Blair: Luck might win a game, but that’s about it.
Arden Zwelling: About as close to the chaotic randomness end as one can get. The absolute highest probability of winning a single playoff game I’d ever give a team is 55 per cent. An MLB post-season, a seven-game series, a nine-inning game, a three-out inning, a plate appearance, a thrown pitch, a swing decision, a muscle twitch — these are all complex systems. And complex systems are inherently unpredictable.
Shi Davidi: Not to muddy the question, but I don’t see these things as being mutually exclusive. Playoff baseball really is random, because you can happen to catch a team at its best or worst stretch in a limited timeframe. That’s real. And no one wins a World Series by luck, either. Real strategic planning goes into every title run. So, the reality is, all the best intentions that clubs put into their championship aspirations run into the chaos of small-sample randomness, where you can either become or run into a club that has everything fall its way, catapulting or derailing the work put in.
David Singh: I spent hours trying to determine my answer and kept falling back to the old line, “You have to be good to be lucky.” I tend to believe success at this time of year requires a special level of fortitude.
Ben Nicholson-Smith: The best team on paper might not always win, and if there’s a secret sauce for succeeding when the lights are brightest, executives are still trying to find it. So October is unpredictable, no doubt about that.
But everything is earned in the playoffs. Personally, I bristle when I hear people say October is random because I think that undermines the work players and coaches have to do to reach the World Series. This isn’t blackjack, where there’s a ceiling to how much you can improve your odds; there’s no limit on creativity or coaching or payroll in baseball. So while the team that wins the World Series might not have the best roster, it did have the best season and that’s what we’re trying to measure here. Flags fly forever.
3. How do you define success for the Blue Jays this post-season?
Shi Davidi: Given where they were a year ago, simply qualifying is a success, but given that they won the AL East and have shown what they’re capable of, fairly or not that bar has moved. Winning a post-season game for the first time since 2016 would be a start, but more than that, having a good showing and getting beaten by a quality opponent, as opposed to losing dispiritingly as they did in 2022 and 2023, matters. This is the most complete edition of the Blue Jays of this era, so not advancing to the ALCS would be disappointing, but this team can’t have the central focus after the playoffs end be blowing a massive lead, or a controversial pitching pull the way it was the last two times.
Arden Zwelling: Finishing atop the American League and winning the most games of any Blue Jays team in over three decades is already a smashing success. But if we’re looking at the post-season in a vacuum, I’d say qualifying for the ALCS.
Ben Nicholson-Smith: Already, the Blue Jays have had a hugely successful regular season, one of the best in franchise history. If they win a playoff round and reach the ALCS, I’d say the post-season has been a success, too.
Jeff Blair: When you stay in first place in the AL East from July 3 onward and run a $250-million payroll, it has to be ALCS or bust.
David Singh: Winning even one game would make this the most successful Blue Jays’ club in a decade, yet given where this core is with age and impending free agency, I don’t think anything less of a World Series appearance can be deemed a success.
4. Which Blue Jays player are you especially interested to watch this October? And one player from around the league?
Arden Zwelling: On the Blue Jays, Max Scherzer. Few pitchers are more entertaining, and no Blue Jay is more accomplished in October. If the Blue Jays are going to get where they want to go, Scherzer’s going to play a part in it. League-wide, Shohei Ohtani. He’s the greatest player in the sport’s history. Don’t take him for granted.
Jeff Blair: Forget this regular season or the next 14 years: Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s career will be defined by his post-season performances. Just like Auston Matthews. And I hate to be overly obvious, but it will be fascinating seeing how Shohei Ohtani is utilized, now that he’s pitching.
David Singh: Ernie Clement. He’s got this distinct role-player aura that I can’t really describe and just makes sense as an October hero. As for around the league, the easy answer is Shohei Ohtani, who finally gets the chance to showcase his two-way abilities in October.
Shi Davidi: The easy answer is Vladimir Guerrero Jr., especially given his past couple of weeks, but how can it not be him? Especially if the Blue Jays end up facing the Yankees in the next round; pitting his production against that of Aaron Judge, he’s going to be a focal point. What’s interesting is that as dreadful as Guerrero Jr.’s last two weeks of the season were — 9-for-52 with four RBIs — he still finished third in the AL with 31 hits in September. So, he was really good relatively recently, and this would be a good time to get back to that.
League-wide, there are so many choices here, but let’s go with Hunter Greene. Starting Game 1 of the wild-card round vs. the all-world Dodgers, the L.A. kid with triple-digit velo on an upstart Reds team can put his hometown team into drama immediately.
Ben Nicholson-Smith: In Toronto, I find Vladimir Guerrero Jr. to be the most compelling player on that roster. He and Bo Bichette have never celebrated a single playoff win in Toronto, but Guerrero Jr.’s swings down the stretch left a lot to be desired. Watching him attempt to turn it around in October will be fascinating.
Beyond the Blue Jays, my answer is always Shohei Ohtani, but beyond Ohtani I’ll be watching Bryce Harper and Josh Naylor, two players who bring power and intensity to the field every day. But there’s also Jose Caballero of the Yankees. While Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton drive New York’s offence, Caballero’s speed, defence and versatility offer a nice counterpoint to a roster that can seem two-dimensional at times. It won’t be a surprise if Caballero has a huge moment in October.
from Sportsnet.ca
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