Baseball is the ultimate “talking sport” partly because it is so nuanced and partly because so often results come down to the tiniest play made — or not made. The 2025 World Series was “one for the ages,” coming, as it almost had to, down to the last play of an extra inning.
Regardless of what smart or dumb moves each manager and coaching staff made for the first 71 innings, it was the bottom of the 9th of game 7 on which the entire series turned, with each coaching staff playing a huge part and both helping the Dodgers.
Jays’ Coaches: An Inexplicable Instruction
Turns out Isiah Kiner-Falefa was told to do exactly what he did: take a miniscule lead off of 3B while representing the winning run with the bases loaded and one out. The theory was they didn’t want Kiner-Falefa to risk getting doubled off of 3B.
Better would have been to remind him of the adage “Line drive, first step back to the bag” as that’s what actually prevents runners from getting doubled off. Following that fundamental principle, a runner can safely take a lead as big as the distance between the 3Bman and the 3B bag — or at least a lead of several steps and not just one.
Apparently the Blue Jays were deeply concerned about the highly improbable occurrence of a liner that Max Muncy had to lunge to his right to catch right near the bag — one which still would have afforded Kiner-Falefa the chance to get back safely if following the “first step back to the bag” principle.
And just as apparently the Jays were not especially concerned about the odds of a ground ball pitcher getting a ground ball that resulted in a close play at the plate. Had Kiner-Falefa had even a lead that was too small, just not absurdly hugging the bag, he scores the winning run and Toronto is hoisting a World Series trophy.
Once again, there is NO justification for a runner to take that small a lead in that situation. None. The Jays just ordered it anyway and it quite literally cost them a World Series.
Dave Roberts: A Series Saving Substitution
Rarely do you see a fielder switched out for another fielder in the middle of an inning. But as Tommy Edman jogged in from CF he was not being moved to form a 5-man infield. He was coming out of the game in favor of Andy Pages.
Presumably, a big part of the reason was that Pages has the better arm and a sacrifice fly was enough to end the game. But Pages is also just the superior CFer and Roberts was putting his best defensive foot forward when the game, and series, was hanging in the balance on the shoulders of his pitcher and defense.
When Ernie Clement hit a deep fly ball to left-center, Kike Hernandez raced back from LF in desperate pursuit. He wound up looking at the ball over his shoulder and was just about to miss it when out of nowhere came Pages, crashing into Hernandez while securing the ball.
No way does Edman make that play and it is highly improbable Hernandez’ glove was about to find the ball. The only reason the Dodgers survived the bottom of the 9th was that Roberts got Pages into the game in the nick of time to save it.
So while there will be much focus on a Will Smith 11th inning HR, Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s 34 pitch effort the day after throwing 96 pitches to win game 6, and the Blue Jays’ repeated failure to capitalize after putting a runner at 2B with 0 outs, none of it would have stopped Toronto from being crowned world champs had either of those decisions from the dugout not been made.
That’s baseball fer ya.
