Five Under-the-Radar Storylines To Watch for in the World Series

[Jesse Burrill]

The World Series has arrived, and for the first time in 32 seasons, it will feature the Toronto Blue Jays. The Blue Jays' season has felt like a fairy tale in a way. Coming off an 88-loss last-place finish in 2024, expectations were tempered entering the season.

But then the Blue Jays started winning, and they didn't stop. Their 18-10 record was the best in the Grapefruit League, and fast forward six months later, they won the American League East for the first time in a decade. Three weeks after that, the Blue Jays had beaten the New York Yankees in the Division Series and the Seattle Mariners in the Championship Series. They are now just four wins away from being World Series champions.

Standing in their way are the Los Angeles Dodgers, the reigning champions, one of baseball’s true powerhouses. They have won their division in 12 of the last 13 seasons and are loaded with multiple-time All-Stars, former MVP winners, and a starting rotation that most teams envy. They’re here for a reason, and they will be a formidable test for the Blue Jays.

But the Dodgers are beatable, at least that's what manager John Schneider said at media day on Thursday. And he’s right. Both of these teams are good teams and deserve to be at this stage. In baseball, anyone can win.

As always, the Fall Classic will be loaded with storylines to follow, from Bo Bichette’s health, to Teoscar Hernández's return to Toronto, to the lingering Shohei Ohtani narrative from his 2023 free agency saga. Those storylines will dominate the headlines, but beyond them, several more under-the-radar storylines will play a role in deciding whether the Blue Jays finally end their 32-year championship drought or if the Dodgers' dynasty will continue.

1) Myles Straw vs. Roki Sasaki
Blue Jays fans will remember this fondly. In a trade back in January, the Blue Jays acquired $2 million in international bonus pool space and Myles Straw in exchange for a PTBNL or cash. The assumption at the time was that the Blue Jays were going all out to acquire Japanese pitcher Roki Sasaki. The deal took a lot of scrutiny, as Straw was set to make $6.4 million in 2025 and an additional $7.4 million in 2026, which at the time pushed the Blue Jays over the first CBT threshold. All that for a player who played strong defence and had some speed, but was ultimately held to just four ABs in 2024 and spent most of the season in the minor leagues, where he had just a .651 OPS in Triple-A.

To make matters worse, the Blue Jays didn’t even end up signing Sasaki, as just a few hours after the Straw trade was announced, Sasaki revealed that he was signing with the Dodgers, and the Jays looked like they had taken Straw and his salary for nothing.

But of course, that’s not how it played out. Straw had a productive season for the Blue Jays. He played in 137 regular season games, filled in at center field when Daulton Varsho wasn’t able to play, and even added four home runs to boot. His 2.9 bWAR ended up being the sixth highest on the Blue Jays, while Sasaki battled injuries and struggled at times, only putting up 0.3 bWAR.

Straw hasn’t forgotten about the trade either. The Blue Jays ended up using the international bonus pool money to sign 18-year-old right-handed pitcher Seojun Moon out of Korea, and Straw took the time to meet the pitcher when he was in Toronto in September. He joked, “I like to keep up with the prospects, especially to see where my trade money went.”

If Sasaki ends up facing Straw in a high-leverage moment late in a game, this storyline may become extremely relevant.

2) Redemption for Brendon Little
If the Blue Jays had lost the ALCS against the Mariners, one of the key reasons would have been the blown save by Brendon Little in Game 5. Little came into the game with a 2-1 lead in the 8th inning and was unable to get an out. After a solo home run to Cal Raleigh and then back-to-back walks, Little was pulled. The inherited runners came in to score, and the Jays lost 6-2.

It was a devastating moment for Little, who addressed the media post-game, saying, “It feels terrible,” and “I couldn't have pitched worse,” as he looked like he was trying to hold back tears the whole time.

Little had been a rock for the Blue Jays most of the regular season; he ended with a 3.03 ERA on the year and an MLB-high 79 appearances, even earning the title of Jays Centre Reliever of the Year. But as the season went on, his numbers got worse. He threw to a 4.88 ERA in the second half, with his strikeout rate dropping and his walk rate rising during that time.

Little is certainly going to be relied on in the World Series, though, with the Dodgers' lineup being much more lefty-heavy than the Mariners' was; left-handed batters Ohtani, Freddie Freeman and Max Muncy are three big threats featured in the top half of the lineup. Mason Fluharty and Eric Lauer are going to get work too, but if the Blue Jays are going to silence the top bats of the Dodgers, then Little is going to get his opportunity, and with it, a shot at redemption.

3) Does Max Scherzer have one more great start in him?
It seems like a long time ago, but one of the main talking points going into Game 4 of the ALCS was: How will Max Scherzer perform? Over his last six starts of the regular season, Scherzer had an ERA of 9.00, allowing 45 base runners in 25 innings, giving up eight home runs in the process. It felt like the one spot in the rotation that would be a weakness.

But even at the age of 41, Scherzer still had it. He ended up throwing 5.2 IP, allowing just two earned runs, and ultimately earning the win for the Blue Jays. His night included an emphatic “discussion” when John Schneider came out to the mound in the fifth inning, ultimately leaving Scherzer in the game. Mad Max was truly in his finest form.

But now he has to do it again. It hasn’t been confirmed, but it seems likely that Scherzer will start one of the games in L.A. against the Dodgers, and what version of Scherzer the Blue Jays get may make a huge difference in the series. Will it be the player that pitches into the sixth inning, allowing two or fewer runs, or will it be the Scherzer that the Blue Jays threw out in the final month of the regular season? The Blue Jays hope it's the former and that the future Hall of Famer can find his magic just one more time.

4) George Springer vs. the Dodgers
The Dodgers haven't forgotten about George Springer. They have won the World Series twice in the past five seasons, which helps ease the pain, but before all of that was the 2017 World Series, in which the Astros beat the Dodgers in seven games.

Springer was a menace in that series. He hit five home runs, reached base 16 times in those seven games, and produced a staggering 1.471 OPS on his way to winning World Series MVP.

This was the heart of the trash can/sign-stealing era for the Astros, and many Dodgers fans still feel like they were “cheated” out of that World Series. Now, Springer will get a second chance against that same team to prove he can do it because he is simply just that good. In other words, he doesn’t need the aid of a trash can this time.

5) If the Dodgers win, will it really “ruin baseball"?
On a national level, the Dodgers winning wouldn’t ruin anything. Ohtani would get another ring, Clayton Kershaw would get one more championship in his final season as a major leaguer, and the Dodgers dynasty would continue. Now, many Blue Jays fans wouldn't be happy, but there is a bigger point here.

In the offseason, there was chatter that the Dodgers were “ruining baseball.” They were coming off a World Series win with the best player in the world signed to a massive contract with several deferred payments, which helped them to also sign stars like Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Tyler Glasnow the previous offseason. In addition, the Dodgers were able to sign several players for less than their perceived market value because those players wanted to play for L.A. Sasaki, Kirby Yates, Tanner Scott, Teoscar Hernández, Blake Snell, and Tommy Edman all chose to sign with the Dodgers this past winter. Thus, the Dodgers had a team that felt like it would be invincible all season.

They had the highest payroll in baseball, and in this era, aside from some tax penalties, there aren’t a ton of restrictions that discourage teams from spending like the Dodgers did. However, the collective bargaining agreement between MLB and the MLBPA is set to expire on December 1, 2026, and one of the main talking points during negotiations is going to be the issue of a salary cap. The NHL, NBA and NFL all have a cap, but this is something the players' union has fought hard against, and it would be very surprising if they let that go in the next round of negotiations.

It's not fun to think about the potential impact on CBA negotiations during the height of the World Series, but Dodgers manager Dave Roberts brought it to light after the sweep of the Brewers, saying, "Let's get four more wins and really ruin baseball.”

The real answer is whoever wins the World Series will likely not have a major effect on CBA negotiations, but it's going to be a stronger talking point if the Dodgers do end up winning the Fall Classic once again.

For what it's worth, the last time the Blue Jays won a World Series, in 1993, Major League Baseball immediately went into a labour dispute the following season. Nobody wants to see that again, but history has a funny way of repeating itself.

Either way, all the fun starts tonight in Toronto. The Blue Jays' season is either going to end in heartbreak, after coming so close but not quite reaching their goal, or it will end in triumph, with the whole country ready to rejoice and stand on top of the baseball world. And that would be a true fairy tale ending.

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