Los Angeles Dodgers beat Toronto Blue Jays to win the World Series
The Los Angeles Dodgers won the World Series, capturing back-to-back championships after a fierce battle against the Toronto Blue Jays that came down to an 11-inning Game 7 in Toronto on Saturday night.
The Dodgers defeated the Blue Jays 5-4 at the Rogers Center in Toronto, becoming the first Major League Baseball team to win back-to-back championships since the New York Yankees won three in a row between 1998 and 2000. The Blue Jays were chasing their first World Series win since 1993, when they also posted back-to-back wins as reigning champions beginning in 1992.
Fox Sports host Alex Rodriguez, a former Yankee star, said bluntly, “This is the best World Series game I’ve ever seen,” during Fox’s post-game show.
The network couldn’t have written a game that led to a bigger finish. Toronto led 4-3 entering the ninth inning. Toronto fans stood and prepared to cheer for the team’s first Series victory in 32 years. In the top of the ninth, Dodgers short stop Miguel Rojas scored the tying run. In the top of the eleventh, catcher Will Smith delivered the decisive winning run.
The win came after a hard-fought see-saw of a fall classic that proved the Dodgers and Blue Jays were evenly matched in the battle for the Commissioner’s Trophy. The games were a big showcase for Dodgers stars like Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman and Mookie Betts and they provided a big audience for Fox, although not as big as last year’s series between the Dodgers and New York Yankees. But it was pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto who won the Series’ MVP trophy because of his incredible arm and the steely determination he showed in the tense final minutes.
The Blue Jays won at home in Game 1 with a decisive 11-4 victory. The Dodgers came back to win Game 2 in Toronto (5-1) and Game 3 (6-5) at home. Game 3 turned out to be an epic 18-inning battle. Then the Blue Jays rallied to win Game 4 (6-2) and Game 5 (6-1) in Los Angeles. The Dodgers then led the Blue Jays in Game 6 (3-1).
Through its first five games, the World Series has averaged 12.5 million viewers for Fox’s linear network, Fox Sports streaming and Fox Deportes. Game 5, held on Halloween night, rose to 14.6 million viewers, with a peak audience of 16 million in the final 15 minutes.
However, last year’s game between the Dodgers and Yankees carried more weight in the country’s largest TV market, even though that series only lasted five games. Through Game 5 in 2024, the average viewership was 15.8 million. This year’s five-game average is the second highest since 2018, according to Fox Sports.
The draw of a Game 7 – dubbed “the two best words in sports” – was also a draw for Hollywood marketers with titles that needed to reach a wide audience. Universal’s ‘Wicked: For Good’ showed high-profile teaser spots during the game, as did Disney’s ‘Zootopia 2’ and Netflix’s ‘Stranger Things 5’.
The 2025 World Series provided some standout moments for Dodgers superstars. Ohtani pitched the first two and a half innings of Game 7 and also delivered big home runs in earlier games. Freeman capped the wild 18-inning game with a walk-off home run that only further endeared him to Dodger fans. Betts accounted for the winning runs in Game 6. And outfielder Kiké Hernández had an impressive, game-saving double play in Game 6.
Before the Yankees in the late 1990s, the Blue Jays were the last team to post back-to-back wins in 1992 and 1993.
The Dodgers plan to hold a victory parade in Los Angeles on Monday.
