As the Toronto Blue Jays prepare for a winner-take-all World Series Game 7 on Saturday at Rogers Centre, they’ll put their trust in someone who’s done it before.
Max Scherzer will get the ball for the final game of the post-season, Blue Jays manager John Schneider confirmed on Friday. First pitch Saturday will fly just after 8 p.m. ET/ 5 p.m. PT on Sportsnet and Sportsnet+.
The two-time World Series champion started the last World Series Game 7 in 2019 for the Washington Nationals, pitching five innings of two-run ball in against the Houston Astros in a championship-clinching win.
Scherzer is about to become the only living pitcher to start a winner-take-all World Series Game 7 for a second time. He will be the first man to pitch in nine winner-take-all games, according to MLB’s Sarah Langs.
Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts will hand the ball to Shohei Ohtani after he said that his Game 7 starter has yet to be decided when addressing the media following his team’s win in Game 6.
Los Angeles had been expected to start Tyler Glasnow before he closed out a 3-1 victory in Game 6. The six-foot-eight right-hander is likely still available.
Only Bob Gibson (1964, ‘67, ’68) and Lew Burdette and Don Larsen (both 1957 and ‘58) have started multiple winner-take-all Game 7s in the World Series. While Burleigh Grimes started Game 7 in 1920 and ’31, his first was in a year the Series was best-of-nine.
Outfielder Myles Straw said after the Game 6 loss that it was apparent Scherzer was ready for the climactic finale.
“I was in the tub and I was watching him walking around the training room. He looks like he’s ready to throw right now,” said Straw of Scherzer, who’s renowned for his intensity. “I didn’t say anything to him in there, but he looks like he’s ready to go. He looked pissed off. He looks like he does on his start day.
“I love that. He’s a competitor. That’s why we got him this year, for these moments. I know he’s going to be ready.”
“Max has been getting ready for Game 7 when he knew he was pitching Game 3,” added Schneider.
Scherzer last started the Blue Jays’ marathon Game 3 loss to the Dodgers, allowing three runs and six baserunners over 4.1 frames of the 18-inning affair.
Solo home runs to Teoscar Hernandez and Ohtani were the primary blemishes on Scherzer’s outing.
Toronto gave the three-time Cy Young Award winner a $15.5 million, one-year contract as a free agent last winter. Scherzer picked his destination hoping to win a third World Series ring, after titles with Washington in 2019 and Texas in 2023. The 18-year big league veteran has eagerly shared his experience with the Blue Jays.
“He’s not afraid to question baserunning, question defence, question offence. He still thinks he’s our best baserunner on the team from his days with the Nationals,” Blue Jays manager John Schneider said Friday. “He’s not afraid to push the envelope. He’s not afraid to be curious. He’s not afraid to share things that he’s been through that maybe I haven’t been through.”
“There’s a lot of teams that don’t like Max Scherzer just because he questions everything,” teammate Chris Bassitt added. “He wants to know every little detail from outfield positioning to why you’re throwing this pitch to who is playing here to how we control off days.
“So many organizations, I feel like, don’t like to answer questions. They like you to be a robot and say, ‘yes sir, and go about your business.’”
Scherzer went 5-5 with a 5.19 ERA in 17 starts this season. The eight-time All-Star didn’t pitch between March 29 and June 25 because of right thumb inflammation, then was left off Toronto’s roster for the first round of the playoffs after he went 0-3 in his last five starts, bothered by neck pain.
He turned back the clock during the American League Championship Series, winning Game 4 against Seattle after shouting down Schneider during a mound visit.
Bassitt was asked by Toronto to assist in recruiting Scherzer, a teammate on the 2022 New York Mets, and praised general manager Ross Atkins for making the move.
“I told Ross: This was going to be a headache for you, having Max Scherzer. And then I told the pitching staff about him, and I told the coaching staff, like: This is a guy that’s going to stir a lot of pots,” Bassitt said. “So everyone looked at Max, the 41-year-old that might end up on the IL a couple times, and they don’t understand the true value of having that veteran guy that knows what it takes to win, and then he might teach you a thing or two along the way, too.”
Glasnow got three outs on three pitches to end Game 6. After Roki Sasaki left runs at second and third with no outs in the ninth, Glasnow popped up Ernie Clement on the first pitch, then Andres Gimenez hit a liner to left fielder Kiké Hernandez, who caught it and doubled off Addison Barger at second base.
Glasnow, acquired from Tampa Bay in December 2023, was sidelined between April 27 and July 9 by right shoulder inflammation. The 32-year-old right-hander has a 1.42 ERA in three starts and two relief outings this postseason.
Toronto will be playing a World Series Game 7 for the first time — the Blue Jays won their only championships in six games in both 1992 and ’93.
The LA Dodgers won their only World Series Game 7 at Minnesota in 1965 when Sandy Koufax pitched a three-hit shutout on two days’ rest after his four-hit shutout won Game 5. They lost Game 7 at home to Houston in 2017. Going back, the Brooklyn Dodgers lost Game 7 to the Yankees in 1947, ‘52 and ’56, and beat the Yankees in Game 7 in 1955.
–With files from the Associated and Canadian Press
