TORONTO — Over the past six weeks, an early lead with Blake Snell on the mound has essentially been an automatic win for the Los Angeles Dodgers. But facing the American League champion Toronto Blue Jays — authors of an MLB-best 49 comeback victories in the regular season and purveyors of a particularly explosive offense all October — on Friday in Game 1 of the World Series, that traditionally comfortable circumstance turned out to be anything but.
After Toronto fell down 2-0 to Los Angeles through three innings, Daulton Varsho’s game-tying, two-run homer in the bottom of the fourth was a crucial first counterpunch in what spiraled into a total meltdown on the mound for the Dodgers. Toronto erupted for nine runs in the sixth inning, headlined by Addison Barger’s dramatic, pinch-hit grand slam — the first of its kind in World Series history. Shohei Ohtani’s first career World Series home run, a roof-scraping, two-run shot in the seventh, was ultimately a footnote in an 11-4 Toronto triumph.
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That Varsho hit a big home run in October is not especially stunning. The 29-year-old center fielder enjoyed a huge power uptick in 2025, albeit in an abbreviated sample due to shoulder surgery that delayed his start to the season and a left hamstring strain that cost him all of June and July. When healthy, though, Varsho slugged like never before, smashing 20 home runs in 71 regular-season games and registering career-best marks in barrel rate, average exit velocity and hard-hit rate. His .310 ISO ranked seventh among MLB hitters with at least 250 plate appearances, behind a who’s who of the game’s best power bats: Aaron Judge, Cal Raleigh, Shohei Ohtani, Nick Kurtz, Kyle Schwarber and Giancarlo Stanton.
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But a key caveat regarding Varsho’s breakout season is that the vast majority of his production came against right-handed pitching. The first 18 of his 20 homers in the regular season came against righties, and his OPS against southpaws (.701) was markedly worse than against right-handers (.865). Because of his elite defense in center field, Varsho does not get platooned as aggressively as some of the other left-handed bats on the Jays’ roster, but his level of comfort against same-handed pitching has been a work in progress.
And on Friday, this wasn’t just any left-hander Varsho was digging in against. Snell is a two-time Cy Young winner who hit his stride down the stretch and was nearly untouchable in three prior postseason starts (0.86 ERA in 21 innings). Snell hadn’t allowed a home run in his previous 49 2/3 innings, regular season and postseason, dating to Aug. 29. He had yet to allow a hit to a left-handed hitter in October, and he hadn’t surrendered a home run to a lefty bat since Juan Soto took him deep on June 2, 2024.
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Undaunted, Varsho stepped to the plate in the bottom of the fourth as the tying run after Alejandro Kirk led off the inning with a deep single off the right-field wall to end an eight-pitch at-bat. Evidently, Varsho had less interest in engaging in a lengthy battle: He unleashed his quick and powerful swing on the first pitch from Snell, a 96.1-mph fastball in the heart of the strike zone, and sent it directly over the pitcher’s head, soaring toward center field. A projected 423 feet later, the ball crashed high above the fence off the navy blue batter’s eye for a game-tying, two-run blast that invigorated the Rogers Centre crowd of 44,353 and injected a much-needed jolt of confidence into the Blue Jays’ dugout.
“For me, [facing] lefties has been up and down,” Varsho said afterward. “Right away, I was struggling against them. I wasn’t seeing left-handed starters very often. … But overall, I started getting comfortable, having a better approach, just knowing what I need to swing at and what I need to take. And obviously, just trying to get a good pitch to hit and try not to miss it.”
“I believe his first at-bat was a breaking ball that he kind of just missed,” manager John Schneider said postgame, in reference to Varsho’s first-inning flyout on a curveball in the middle of the plate. “And I saw him being ready to attack a fastball.
“Tomorrow will be a different set of circumstances, but these games come down to players in the moment making adjustments and executing. Blake is a damn good pitcher. You’re going to have to do something like that, make him work early, hopefully you hit a mistake. But Varsh and everyone in there is not going to back down, which is what I love about this group.”
Varsho’s biggest Blue Jays moment yet marks the highest peak in a tenure that has featured no shortage of ups and downs. Drafted by Arizona in 2017, Varsho arrived in Toronto via trade in December 2022, a deal that did not look favorable for the Jays initially, considering the immediate success of Lourdes Gurriel Jr. and Gabriel Moreno as D-backs. While his outstanding glove in center has only gotten better with the Blue Jays — a remarkable development considering Varsho’s background as a catcher early in his career — his bat lagged behind during his first two years as a Blue Jay, and there wasn’t much reason for optimism entering Year 3, considering his 2024 ended with right shoulder surgery.
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But behind the scenes, Varsho was intent on figuring out what works best for him in the batter’s box, even coming off a procedure that impacted his upper-half mobility in the early going.
“Obviously, the first two seasons weren’t the seasons that I think everybody expected from me,” he said. “And this season, obviously, being hurt and kind of going up and down with injuries. I think, overall, learning my swing and what I need to do to be successful up here has been great. Honestly, it’s been one of the blessings of having our new hitting coaches here because I learned so much about it.”
The trio of offensive minds Varsho is referring to — hitting coach David Popkins and assistant hitting coaches Hunter Mense and Lou Iannotti — helped him develop a mindset at the plate that maximizes his natural physical abilities. Ask Varsho to explain that approach, and the answer sounds counterintuitive.
“For me, I’m trying to hit a ground ball back to the pitcher,” he explained. “That’s been my goal all season. I know it’s not, like, what everybody says about launch angle. [But] I literally try to hit a ground ball right back to the pitcher, and it works for me.
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“It’s really easy for me to hit the ball in the air,” continued Varsho, whose 31.6% groundball rate is sixth-lowest in MLB the past three seasons. “I’ve known that my whole life. So for me, I have to really exaggerate going down to the baseball, and it works out for me because I am able to keep my bat in the zone a long period of time when I do that.”
In striking a balance between how his swing functions and what approach yields the best results, Varsho unlocked a new level at the plate, one that has elevated his entire profile.
“I wish Varsh was healthy the whole year, for him and for us, but mainly for him,” Schneider said after Game 1. “He’s always had this potential. … and I think he’s just coming into a complete player. We always think about his defense and his baserunning, but the added threat there with the power is huge.”
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Amid a Blue Jays playoff run defined by different players stepping up at different junctures to ensure the magical ride continues, Varsho’s heroics on Friday represented something of a crucial stepping stone. His fourth-inning swat got the bats started, and an avalanche of offense followed, encapsulating the fully functioning state of Toronto’s lineup and showcasing just how dangerous this offense can be.
If the Blue Jays are to succeed in dethroning the defending champs, a complete team effort will continue to be required each night. In Game 2 on Saturday, Dodgers righty Yoshinobu Yamamoto looms as Toronto’s next tall task.
“It was really a good approach from everyone today,” Schneider said. “Then you got to get ready for tomorrow against another really tough pitcher.”