Dodger fans, former players rally in Santa Monica ahead of World Series Game 1 against Blue Jays
SANTA MONICA, Calif. (KABC) -- Dodger fans on Thursday were joined by three of the teams former players as they rallied in Santa Monica on the day before Game 1 of the World Series against the Blue Jays.
"I think it's great everybody's coming out to cheer for our Dodgers and get us ready for the game," said Jesse Guerolla, who attended the rally at Third Street Promenade with his family. "
Also in attendance were veteran Dodger players Eric Karros, Steve Garvey and Adrián González.
"This is just a formality, playing the games," Karros said in a bit of good-natured trash talk. "The Dodgers are going to win this thing. The right blue team is going to win."
Dodger fan Caitlin Snyder said, "There's this thing that pulled at my heartstrings, of like, oh, this is like the community of Dodgers fans. I was like, oh, I love this."
Been a long time
When the World Series was last played outside of the United States, Toronto won its second straight title in 1993 when Joe Carter hit a ninth-inning homer off Philadelphia's Mitch Williams in Game 6, the second Series-ending home run after Pittsburgh's Bill Mazeroski against the New York Yankees in Game 7 in 1960.
Since then, the Blue Jays became Canada's sole Major League Baseball team when the Montreal Expos moved to Washington, D.C., for the 2005 season.
Toronto's home was renamed from the SkyDome to Rogers Centre in 2005, a year after Rogers Communications Inc. became the Blue Jays' sole owner. The ballpark's capacity was cut from 52,000 to just under 45,000 and more upgrades are planned ahead of 2026.
Canada Prime Minister Mark Carney attended Blue Jays batting practice.
"We represent this entire country and we're this country's team, so we want to go out there and do everything we can to make this country proud of us," said Trey Yesavage, the 22-year-old who opens the Series on the mound for Toronto in just his seventh big league start.
Ohtani preps on the field
Ohtani usually prefers to take batting practice in an indoor cage, but he took BP on the field on Thursday, hitting drives off the batter's eye behind the center-field fence like a basketball player making bank shots. He also sprayed balls off the flight deck fan area and the scoreboard above.
In a 2-for-25 slump, Ohtani also took on-field BP last Thursday, then had a three-homer game against Milwaukee the next day while pitching six shutout innings with 10 strikeouts.
Snell returns to the Series for first time since 2020
Left-hander Blake Snell will start for Los Angeles in his first Series appearance since 2020, when he started Game 6 for Tampa Bay against the Dodgers.
Trying to overcome a 3-2 Series deficit, Tampa Bay was ahead 1-0 when Snell allowed a one-out single to Austin Barnes in the sixth inning on his 73rd pitch. Rays manager Kevin Cash brought in Nick Anderson, and the Dodgers rallied to win.
"Probably for like a week I was thinking about it, what could have been different, what I could have done, the ups and downs of just feelings," Snell said. "But then ultimately it led to - if I would have done more early on in my career to gain his trust, it would have been a different outcome I think."
Given a 5-0 lead in Game 2, Snell was removed after allowing Chris Taylor's two-run homer in the fifth followed by a walk and a single.
"Learn from it and ultimately it made me a better pitcher," Snell said, "just because I understand the game more than just myself, just the pieces, the parts and how it all works."
Snell spent 2021-23 with San Diego and 2024 with San Francisco, and the two-time Cy Young Award winner signed a $182 million, five-year contract with the Dodgers.
"I've matured. I've grown up. I was kind of a kid still in 2020," said Snell, who turns 33 in December. "I know I only have so much time left. I'm not young .I don't really think about the ending. For now I'm just more appreciative of the moments, the time and what these mean for my career."
Rust vs. rest history appears to show off time is disadvantage
Since the League Championship Series were extended to seven games in 1985, the four matchups between teams coming off seven-game series and four-game sweeps all were won by the teams who played the lengthier pennant playoffs: the 1988 Dodgers over Oakland, the 2006 St. Louis Cardinals against Detroit, the 2007 Boston Red Sox over Colorado and 2012 San Francisco Giants against the Tigers.
Toronto's Vladimir Guerrero Jr. enters hitting .442 with six homers and 12 RBIs in 11 postseason games.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
